Hub You - Writing and Speaking

10 4-Letter Words You Need In Your Vocabulary
When you were growing up did your parents teach you not to use 4-letter words?Mine sure did.Oh, they didn't mean "all" 4-letter words, just a select few but those were a real no-no in my house.Well, today I am going to list 10 4-letter words that you should not only be using but should be living if you want your online business to succeed.----------Work - "sustained physical or mental effort to overcome obstacles and achieve an objective or result"While this is a word we would all like to get out of our vocabulary it's 1 that we can't avoid - especially when you're first starting your online business.There are no true "get rich" schemes or programs although there are many that make that offer. And it's true that someone does "get rich" with them - the ones who "worked" to set them up!---------Time - " the measured or measurable period during which an action, process, or condition exists or continues"While we would all like less "work", we would like to have more "time" - there's just never enough of it!But in online businesses there is no

that if you write from a position of truly wanting to help others – and not from a desire to optimize a site for "x" key word or to “just” make money – you will always have a wellspring of ideas from which to pull.

Question b) Writers block (I find it very difficult to write). I constantly rewrite my business plans. Any tips?

Answer: When I first started my blog, my fear too was that I wouldn’t be able to fill it with fresh, interesting content on a consistent basis. BUT, I’ve found that the more I write, the more ideas I flesh out. Focus on detailed articles (solving one problem of one issue), not general ones, and you will most likely find that you have to CUT your word count, not struggle to increase it.

As for your difficulty writing, my advice is – just write. Initially, don’t worry about grammar, word count, organization, etc. Just get your ideas down on paper. Then, go back and flesh out pertinent points. One written “rambling” may contain seeds for several articles.

Question c) I'd love to start a blog but generating content causes a) and b)!

Answer: Save a copy of your written ramblings. Thinking that you will remember an idea is folly – it will invariably escape you. I have a document on my computer entitled “Article Ideas.” I constantly add to this as new ideas pop into my head. On those days when the idea well runs dry (it happens to the best of us), it comes in handy.

Question c) Are there resources (a quick course in creative writing) that can help me?

Answer: There are so many on the web, they are too numerous to name. I hesitat

Domain Names and Registrars
When choosing what registrar to use when acquisitioning a domain name there are many options. Domain names are hostnames that provide interchanging connections for various internet addresses between each other. They allow for movement from one hostname to another. Corresponding letters make up each domain name and are arranged in accordance with the user's wants and needs.The first decision to make is do you need a domain name? Knowing what purpose it serves will better enhance your ability to choose what server to use. Will this domain name be for personal use or business? If personal, use your internet service provider for a free page if available. If business, be careful of who you use because in advertising being visible and memorable is very important. So which domain name registrars are good and what services can each provide in comparison to the others? Let's take two examples and compare them.1stDomain.Net is an international domain registration service. Based in Hawaii it allows super fast connections between the US and Asia. It is also accredited with ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assi

An overworked freelancer, I decided to try and create more passive income. My mode of trying to accomplish this is article marketing. Why article marketing?

I’d read so much about it and had used it to promote past businesses with some success (a little bit of time yielded pretty good results). So, from October 18th thru November 18th, I decided to study article marketing in detail to learn as much about it as I could.

For details on the beginning of the experiment, see the 10/26/06 post on InkwellEditorial.blogspot.com. Following are reader questions about my findings to date.

QUESTIONS FROM READERS ABOUT ARTICLE MARKETING

Question: Since your site has been around a while, do you think that's why you've been so successful with your experiment. My site is new, what do you think my chances are?

Answer: I’m sure my site’s popularity has something to do with the success of the case study, however, I think it has more to do with the topic and the in-depth information provided.

I think the following three things have been the main reason for the success of this case study:

1. In my opinion, any time you undertake a venture that no one else has put significant time into – and it is a fairly popular topic that a lot of people want to know about -- it will garner interest.

2. The internet makes it easier to reach a wide audience quickly; and

3. It is a “live experiment with instant results.” We live in an information age where people want to know – and they want to know TODAY.

Question: How much money are you actually making? Can you give specifics?

Answer: The Google Adsense program prohibits giving specifics, but as I said in one of my recently published pieces, I was making basically entertainment money (barhopping with friends kind of cash), car payment money, etc. My earnings have a little more than doubled since I started this experiment.

What I want everyone to realize is that the more money you make, the harder it is to double that. So, it’s not like I what I was making was terribly difficult to double – I’m just surprised that by pumping in a few extra hours per day that I was able to see such a big difference.

The whole point of the experiment is to see if this was viable – if article marketing was really what the experts were touting. It’s taken a good deal of work, but I needed to know if it would be worth my time to pursue it to any degree. So far, I have to say that for me, it definitely is.

Question: Can you recommend any article submission software?

Answer: Nope, not at this point. I’m manually submitting articles to the directories. BUT, I will be purchasing some article submission software once this experiment is done. I have my eye on a couple, but as I haven’t used any, I hesitate to recommend any. Spend a few days researching this on the web before you put out any money. And if anyone has any feedback they can pass along, I’d be happy to share it.

Question: Are you consciously changing articles from posts on your blog to avoid duplicate content penalties?

Answer: No, I’m not. That would be way to time consuming for me. I queried Chris Knight, who manages perhaps the number one article directory on the net (EzineArticles.com), about duplicate content penalties.

My question to him was: **To Whom It May Concern: I would like to ask Mr. Knight a question about being penalized for submitting the same article to many directories. Specifically, if you do this, are you penalized by the likes of Google? Does it hurt your site's ranking?**

Christopher Knight’s response: To answer your question, unfortunately, I have no idea what Google will do or won't do. Me personally? I wouldn't submit to hundreds of directories because that doesn't seem like a good return on your time.

I know that it's better to submit 100 articles to 1 directory than submitting 1 article to 100 directories; especially when that 1 directory is EzineArticles.com! :-)

Try that experiment for yourself and I bet you'd find the same conclusion I did. The bigger issue is do you really want to manage 100 different trust relationships with your article or just a handful? Best of luck with the study. *End of response.*

I did a little more research and found arguments on both sides. All I can say is, from my efforts so far, the following has happened:

Google Search Results: A Google search of my name before this study returned 700-800 results. As of today, 11/6/06, it returns 15,100 results.

Alexa Rankings: My site's (InkwellEditorial.com) Alexa ranking was over 6,000,000 right before the beginning of this experiment (10/18/06). As of today, it’s 3,320,982.

PR Ranking: My PR ranking has stayed at 5, but I’ve gotten links from sites that have PR ranks of 6 (eg, www.entrepreneurs-journey.com) and 7 (http://problogger.net) – which, ostensibly, will only add to my PR ranking in the future.

Will I be penalized somewhere down the road for this? As I’m an SEO (search engine optimization) neophyte, I have no idea. I plan on doing a lot more in the way of SEO. This whole study has made me realize the importance of learning more about this.

Question: How do you decide what topic to write on?

Answer: I write what interests me, what others are asking about, issues I think need to be addressed, etc. I don’t have a process, so to speak, I just – write.

Question: An abbreviated version of a question a reader sent in is as follows: Wondering if I'd be able to pick your brains slightly. I write business plans for clients but at the moment it has been practically impossible for me to get any work . . . I would love to write articles but my problem has been:

Question a) Actually finding things to write about let alone a 700-900 word article scares me to bits! What sort of analysis tool do you use to find topics without much competition?

Answer: Angela, I don’t do any analysis to find topics to write about; I get ideas from reading other articles, questions from readers of my material, addressing issue that are bugging me (my reasoning is, if I’m having a problem with it, others are too – practically nothing under the sun is unique to only one individual); issues in the news; etc.

I don’t mean to be too vague or general – but I find that if you write from a position of truly wanting to help others – and not from a desire to optimize a site for "x" key word or to “just” make money – you will always have a wellspring of ideas from which to pull.

Question b) Writers block (I find it very difficult to write). I constantly rewrite my business plans. Any tips?

Question c) I'd love to start a blog but generating content causes a) and b)!

Question c) Are there resources (a quick course in creative writing) that can help me?

Answer: There are so many on the web, they are too numerous to name. I hesitate

What Makes Adsense Work
What does make Adsense work – there are as many ideas as there are theories. Some maintain it is the placement of the ad on the page, some say integrate it into the page and it must have the look and feel of the webpage. It should be at the top and in this format and so the secrets continue.There is only one real secret to adsense success; it is nothing more than traffic. Without substantial traffic your adsense pages will not make you money. There is proof of this statement, just look at the click through rate that you are receiving on your current pages and you will immediately notice that it takes a lot of visitors to generate a click.If things go really well you could have as high as a fifty percent and upwards CTR. This is possible, has been done and proven, but it won’t just happen on any old page.Placement of the ad does play a role but it is not so big as many would like you to believe. Information on the best placement of adsense code on your page is no secret and is free information on Google. It is called a heat map and will show you exactly where

tually making? Can you give specifics?

Question: Can you recommend any article submission software?

Question: Are you consciously changing articles from posts on your blog to avoid duplicate content penalties?

I know that it's better to submit 100 articles to 1 directory than submitting 1 article to 100 directories; especially when that 1 directory is EzineArticles.com! :-)

I did a little more research and found arguments on both sides. All I can say is, from my efforts so far, the following has happened:

Google Search Results: A Google search of my name before this study returned 700-800 results. As of today, 11/6/06, it returns 15,100 results.

Alexa Rankings: My site's (InkwellEditorial.com) Alexa ranking was over 6,000,000 right before the beginning of this experiment (10/18/06). As of today, it’s 3,320,982.

Question: How do you decide what topic to write on?

Answer: I write what interests me, what others are asking about, issues I think need to be addressed, etc. I don’t have a process, so to speak, I just – write.

Question a) Actually finding things to write about let alone a 700-900 word article scares me to bits! What sort of analysis tool do you use to find topics without much competition?

Question b) Writers block (I find it very difficult to write). I constantly rewrite my business plans. Any tips?

Question c) I'd love to start a blog but generating content causes a) and b)!

Question c) Are there resources (a quick course in creative writing) that can help me?

Answer: There are so many on the web, they are too numerous to name. I hesitat

How To Build up Traffic For Free, Without Spamming
Why would you want a linking strategy for your site? The most important reason is to drive traffic to your site, which in turn would increase visitors that would either purchase from you, make your web site more popular, or reach a larger audience to inform for your cause. The second reason to develop a linking strategy for your site is to help increase your rankings in the search engine. With Google this is very important for achieving high web rankings, and I expect the other search engines to follow suit relatively soon.There are many ways to develop a linking strategy where the links to your site will multiply without any effort from you. This is the most effective way to generate links to point to your site. In this article we will discuss how to do this, debunk myths, and how to do this without unintentionally harming your site's status.Debunking myths:Linking softwareI personally don't approve of linking software that does the work for you. Why? Because the software does not do a good enough job where it can tell if the site it has the same theme or relative content that matches y

Knight, who manages perhaps the number one article directory on the net (EzineArticles.com), about duplicate content penalties.

I know that it's better to submit 100 articles to 1 directory than submitting 1 article to 100 directories; especially when that 1 directory is EzineArticles.com! :-)

I did a little more research and found arguments on both sides. All I can say is, from my efforts so far, the following has happened:

Google Search Results: A Google search of my name before this study returned 700-800 results. As of today, 11/6/06, it returns 15,100 results.

Alexa Rankings: My site's (InkwellEditorial.com) Alexa ranking was over 6,000,000 right before the beginning of this experiment (10/18/06). As of today, it’s 3,320,982.

Question: How do you decide what topic to write on?

Answer: I write what interests me, what others are asking about, issues I think need to be addressed, etc. I don’t have a process, so to speak, I just – write.

Question a) Actually finding things to write about let alone a 700-900 word article scares me to bits! What sort of analysis tool do you use to find topics without much competition?

Question b) Writers block (I find it very difficult to write). I constantly rewrite my business plans. Any tips?

Question c) I'd love to start a blog but generating content causes a) and b)!

Question c) Are there resources (a quick course in creative writing) that can help me?

Answer: There are so many on the web, they are too numerous to name. I hesitat

Debt Solutions - Good Debt vs. Bad Debt
Debt simply means that money was transferred between two parties. It implies that at a future date the loan will be repaid according to the repayment terms. Every time an item is bought we immediately go into debt. If the item is small, we can generally pay immediately and not see any long-term debt. Of course, there are many larger items that we all need but cannot pay for with cash. It causes us to go into debt for months if not years in order to repay.Debt is not a terrible thing to avoid at all costs. Some people feel comfortable paying for everything right up front. Drive used cars, rent an apartment and pay for school once you have the money for it. All items that we buy either appreciate or deprecate in value over time. Buying a brand new car loses could lose 10% in value the second it leaves the dealership's parking lot. At that point, if you sold the vehicle, the value of the car would not even pay for the remaining balance due on your auto loan. Even if the driver uses the vehicle for several years and finally sells it, they may still sell upside down which means they did not receive eno

s stayed at 5, but I’ve gotten links from sites that have PR ranks of 6 (eg, www.entrepreneurs-journey.com) and 7 (http://problogger.net) – which, ostensibly, will only add to my PR ranking in the future.

Question: How do you decide what topic to write on?

Answer: I write what interests me, what others are asking about, issues I think need to be addressed, etc. I don’t have a process, so to speak, I just – write.

Question a) Actually finding things to write about let alone a 700-900 word article scares me to bits! What sort of analysis tool do you use to find topics without much competition?

Question b) Writers block (I find it very difficult to write). I constantly rewrite my business plans. Any tips?

Question c) I'd love to start a blog but generating content causes a) and b)!

Question c) Are there resources (a quick course in creative writing) that can help me?

Answer: There are so many on the web, they are too numerous to name. I hesitat

Tips To Creating A Successful Classified Ad
1. Gather the important basic information about your product.Describe your item as in depth as possible. Include make, model number, etc. The more you can tell the buyer about your items, the more they will understand which items they are purchasing. You will also save yourself a lot of time by not having to answer numerous emails about your product.Sometimes a buyer might be looking for an item because of a specific feature. Even if your item has this feature, but you didn’t include it in your posting, they might pass up buying it. They will probably just assume your item doesn’t have that feature and then move on to the next item.2. Use quality Photos of your ItemTake time to get nice looking photographs of your items. Most people will first look at a picture before they read the ad. If they see dark or out of focus pictures, they will close your ad and just continue to the next ad. If you take nice looking pictures, you will give yourself a better chance to sell your item.3. Price your item rightWhen it comes down to it, price matters. We all think our stuff is

Question b) Writers block (I find it very difficult to write). I constantly rewrite my business plans. Any tips?

Question c) I'd love to start a blog but generating content causes a) and b)!

Question c) Are there resources (a quick course in creative writing) that can help me?

Answer: There are so many on the web, they are too numerous to name. I hesitate to recommend one, because I haven’t taken any. But, go with recognized names in the freelance industry.

To research sources, go to noted sites like WritersDigest.com and WritersMarkets.com. Also, frequent writing forums. Ask questions and/or read feedback from those who have taken courses.

Shameless Plug! My e-course, Launch a Profitable Freelance Writing Career in 30 Days or Less -- Guaranteed! will be available in January.

FREE E-BOOK: There is so much more that I want to address about this topic based on the findings to date. I’m sure there’ll be more after this experiment ends on 11/18/06.

So, I will be doing a final, in-depth case study analysis. The findings will be published in a FREE e-book and will be available the second week of December. Log onto InkwellEditorial.com and subscribe to receive your free copy!

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Home inspection plays a very important role in the real estate process. When you are buying or selling a home, you rely on a home inspector to provide an accurate and reliable inspection of a property. A home inspector will tell you about the condition of the home and help you avoid buying a home that needs major repairs. It is the perfect way to get an in-depth and impartial opinion of your next home before you buy it.

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