Internet Babel

Hi guys,

Finally up and running again (well, hobbling anyway). Battered and Bruised but ready to roll again.

You’ll be pleased to know that my time convalescing didn’t go to waste. I went through all my Aksimet spam and as a result I’ve:

• obtained a couple of Masters Degrees
• restocked on my pharmaceuticals
• improved my sex-life, and
• seen some very ‘educational’ videos

Fully refreshed, I’m ready to start posting again so will be getting some fresh stuff on-line this week.

In the meantime, I also had a chance to review the comments posted in September. Not as many as I would have liked but that’s the way it goes…Jim (as always) made a couple of interesting points – I don’t always agree with him but got a lot of respect for what he does. Melvin and Carl also made some nice contributions (it seems like ‘beabetterblogger.com’ has gone off line though?).

Anyway – John from Coffesh0p was a consistent and intelligent commentator so I’ve decided to to give the hosting and domain prize to him.  John’s agreed to post reports back on his progress with RankFoundry.com  – I know he has a few ideas in store so I’d urge you to support him while he’s trying to build the site.

As Carl mentioned in one of his comments, it’s all about giving people the base material (be it a domain or information or whatever) and then letting them have a go at building something themselves. I’d much rather do that than spoon-feed people, so I look forward to seeing what John can do. Will be in touch with details very soon, John.

Anyway – thanks for bearing with me while I’ve been out of action. I promise that Internet Babel will soon be in full flow again (with the assistance of Whisky & Bourbon).

 Cheers
Dave

Time for another (very) quick round up of what’s been going on and what’s coming up, so welcome to the September Babelicious.

There weren’t too many Blog posts that really caught my eye this last week or two but there are a couple of things worth mentioning:

• A nice little piece on Netstrife about finding Clients if you are a freelancer
• Rules on Guest Blogging by Balkhis on TUK
• DigitalPoint long-running thread about paid search  
• Learn about Google Android – it will be big

As far as Internet Babel is concerned, my last post on ‘Big Bloggers’ (or more accurately, a link within it) got Stumbled and sent a major amount of traffic this way – in fact I got 30,000 page views in 24 hours, which is just ever so slightly more than normal I’ve no idea what kind of retention rate I’ll get but it goes to show just the impact even a silly little thing like that can link can have.

Domain wise, I picked up a heap of bargains this week. Made a couple of small sales too but the ones that I picked up have massive potential so there’ll be some exciting developments soon (either in terms of direct flipping the domain or developing sites on them). 

Anyway – that’s it for now. A few good posts are on their way, including part 4 of Domain Flipping, which will deal with the nitty-gritty of buying and selling on the Forums, Business Blogging, time management, some Free Web Hosting pointers and a few neat niche and audience pieces.

Also, just a reminder that the Comment ‘giveaway’ is still on.

Cheers

Hi everyone – time for the first Internet Babel giveaway (well, the first since I took it over).

First things first – you do NOT have to subscribe or make any other commitment to be in with a chance of winning this. There are no sign-ups or secret passwords or any other kind of nonsense.

All you have to do is comment on a post here during the month of September. I’ll  be selecting MY favourite comment from September, based purely on how much I think it contributes to discussion,  provides useful advice or is in some other way valuable. It doesn’t have to be praise – I’m always open to constructive criticism – but I DO want to try and promote some feedback and discussion on here.

The Prize:

The winning Comment will receive the following:

• the Domain name ‘RankFoundry.com’ (registered at GoDaddy which will be renewed until November 2009) – a great name for someone wishing to set up an SEO or Page Rank building type site.
• a PSD banner logo for RankFoundry.
• 1 year’s free Universal Hosting from ICDSoft.com, which can be used either with RankFoundry.com – or ICDSOFT will provide a free 1-year .com registration if you wish to host another domain on there.

Like I said, there are no strings attached other than a requirement to make a constructive comment during the month of September, on any post published in August or September. I want to try and maintain a level of discussion on Internet Babel, so I look forward to getting some feedback.

For example – what were your thoughts about Greg’s Poker Affiliate guest post? Do you prefer posts relating to SEO and site development as opposed to more traditonal MMO type stuff? Tell me about any particular areas of Domain speculating/parking you want to know more about …and so on.  I’ve got some good posts lined up for the next few weeks so there should be plenty for you to comment on.  

All you gotta do is comment to be in with a chance of this great prize…

Dave

P.S. My decision will be final and based purely on my own criteria as outlined above.

I just went Head-to-Head with the mighty Germz on Melvin’s Blog – see the results here.

By the way, I might have lied a little bit when I described myself as ‘Handsome’ and a ‘Hunk’. The bit about being old and balding was right though.

Thanks to Melvin for doing this nice little series, and thanks to Germz as well ;-)

Dave 

Everyone seems to be into this link love stuff, so I thought I might as well post about a couple of interesting things as well (just don’t want to feel left out really). So this will be a regular-ish post of things I like, don’t like, updates on old posts etc – except I’ve decided to call the stuff I like ‘Babel-icious’.

This time around, I’ve got a couple of Blog posts, one forum thread and a couple of other goodies.

• Dealing with negative comments on Rajaie Talks – nice post:
• Some nice posts revolving around writing for a crust at Write on the Edge
• Somebody slagging off ShoeMoney at Digital Point. Not saying I agree or disagree, but I did find it mildly entertaining. Unfortunately, the mods closed the thread before it could get really interesting (wonder why).
• Getting Real – a no-nonsense ebook about no-nonsense software development. Absolutely worth a read and/or a bookmark. Read it here.
• An update related to the ‘Bad Grammar’ post. This has proven to be one of the most frequently read posts that Nick put up here, and it still gets some traffic. As a follow-up on the whole subject I thought I’d let you know about a good resource site that came to my attention this week -  http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/index.htm. This site has a whole heap of useful information, quizzes and tests all related to different aspects of good grammar like what I write

Anyway – that’s it for now. A few good posts are on their way, including part 2 of Domain Flipping, some cool ideas about niche and audience stuff and an interview related piece with a top bloke in the affiliate arena.

Cheers

A very nice little earner for me today, so I’m a happy chap.

I picked up two domains 3-4 months back, for $8 a piece. I didn’t do anything with them other than park them and collect a few dollars in revenue – but I wasn’t concerned because I KNEW that these were excellent pickups.

Both are three-word .coms, which still aren’t that fashionable but I knew they had the potential to do well their respective niches.

Sold them today for $380.

I can’t be bothered right now to work out the percentages but that is a nice return on an investment of $16.

I buy and sell at least a few domains every week. I’m quite happy to make just a few bucks on a sale, because at my end of the market its a low-investment, low-risk game. Make a quick profit of a few bucks on a sale, about10 times a month keeps the dollars coming in, and I know I’ll make a few bigger sales like these two pretty regularly as well.

Domain (and Website) buying and selling isn’t just for the big boys – it’s possible for any of us to make a decent, regular profit from it as long as you don’t think you’re going to jump straight in and make a million dollar sale – and that’s just what an upcoming series of articles will be about.

And No, I won’t tell you the two domain names in question…

Well – Internet Babel has reached it’s first birthday! It’s not quite 1 month since I took over but I’m looking forward to the next 12 months, when I hope to re-build the stats up to and beyond where we used to be.

July showed some reasonable figures:

Page views: just under 20,000
Subscribers: 178 (min 176 – max 184)
Alexa: 235k
Technorati: 63k

These figures are all somewhat below the peaks reached during the year and they give me something to aim at as a first major target, to get the numbers back up.

Thanks to everyone for the various kind words and messages so far – I’ve been made to feel very welcome and here’s to the next 12 months. Also – thanks to Jason and everyone at the Blog Premiere Forum.

Just had my new header designed, I love it. Think it’s a big improvement and it’s just how I imagined it.

I’d give credit to the designers if I had a name… was just a recommendation from someone I know and an exchange of emails and payments

Tell me what you think of the new header! Navigation bar will be coming soon and I should be slowly revamping Internet Babel’s look over the next few weeks.

I’ve mentioned I have a new project in the works about 3 times now!

Just a quick update, I’ve given nothing away about what it is yet. It’s about… 1 week away from launch I’d say.

It’s sort of 90% done I just need to clean everything up and put everything in place so to speak.

This will be the first place I mention it, though it won’t be the only place it’ll get mentioned

This month I’ll be competing with four other bloggers to see who can gain the most subscribers in one month.

Those being: Ian Fernando, Slyvisions, Thomas Sinfield and The University Kid.

Much like the John Chow vs Shoemoney competition that went on last October. The beginning amount is irrelevant, it’s just who has gained the most readers by the end date.

There are five of us involved which is quite exciting as competitions between bloggers are normally 1 on 1, so this will put all of our marketing skills to the test.

What Can I win?

…I hear you ask! well, I will be putting up some fantastic prizes this month. I will be giving away prizes randomly, in batches, introducing new ones along the way. All sorts to keep you guys alert, guessing and excited

First Prize Batch

Ok, so this is the first little goody bag that someone could be winning this month:

1. A Free brand spanking new copy of Duncan Bannatyne’s Anyone Can Do It
Not worth a large amount financially but I think the book’s value in terms of ownership and quality is worth much more. For those who don’t know who Duncan Bannatyne is, he is one of Britain’s biggest self-made millionaires. He owns a huge chain of gyms and casinos all named after himself, which will nicely carry on his legacy when he’s gone. He started off as an ice cream man, now he’s worth about $6 Hundred Million!

2. Two Months of Free Advertising on Internet Babel – 125 by 125 pixels
Every blogger likes free advertising! so why not have some from me. A 125 by 125 ad in the side panel normally costs $10 a month, so would cost you just $20 for two months. Not a lot but why pay that when you could get it for free! You may not get a ton of traffic but you can bet the traffic you do get. Will be targeted. Provided you blog in the Internet marketing niche of course. But then if you didn’t I don’t see why you’d be reading this.

That’s about it for batch #1. Remember, this is the first batch, you think I’d pull out the big guns yet? Nope! keep reading to catch the top prizes

How Do I Enter?

1. Subscribe Via Email

2. Wait for the announcment to see if you’ve won.

Winner will be announced on the 15th of Feburary!

Final Thoughts…

I try to make my prizes valuable in the highest sense. So I try not to focus solely on financial value because a quality prize such as a fantastic book or audiobook that could have real long lasting value. Could be more valuable than a prize picked purely because it’s expensive to attract more attention.

Much like my Win 3 Free KILLER Logos contest – each logo only cost $37 each but the value to the bloggers that got a brand new quality logo for their blog is long lasting. And worth more than some novelty prize worth much more.

Anyway, hope all my current readers support me in blogging about this. Promoting Internet Babel best they can and staying subscribed and active!

The competition as a whole will end on the 5th of March. Whoever has gained the most from now until then, wins. And the winner gets to have their banner as a gloating privilege on everyone else’s blogs for free, for one month. I’m the underdog in this, starting with the least readers, not that it matters but the underdog always pulls through!

So… I’ll look forward to seeing my freshly made one on display!

Thanks and Good Luck!

Update: New prize added – See here for details