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If there is one debate that I have a lot with my friend, it’s whether or not anyone can make it online. Can some random person just wake up one day and say, “I want to make all my money online,” and then do it? Is that possible or are the current top earners the only ones that can make the money and the rest of us stuck at the bottom making meager amounts while they rack in thousands and thousands a month? Can anyone make it to the top? Do we all have the chance?

In my opinion, yes. I think that we are all able to get there if we have the drive and the motivation to really do it. I think that if I were to sit down from 9-5 and work on my blogs, I could increase traffic double or triple in one week. If I did not have AIM on or I did not have classes, I think I really could easily triple it. I would be able to write two or three posts a day, I would be able to get more things done, and marketing would be a hell of a lot easier. Unfortunately, I don’t have the time to do that, so I am a part time entrepreneur.

But, that doesn’t mean that anyone can’t make it. Anyone CAN make it. You have to work, though. In my opinion, if you have the energy, the drive, the motivation, and the passion for success, you are going to succeed. You need to continue working on it and continue expanding it. If you’re at a plateau with your earnings, do something to push them over that plateau. Whatever you do, you CAN do it if you want to do it. But you need to want to do it and that actually is the hardest part. So WANT it and you will HAVE it.

Last month, I asked if the PageRank update was ever coming. And I ask that again today because it is now September 9 and it is going on a month that the update is late. Now, that is old business, but it brings about another question that I think I have an opinion for. My friend over at King Nomar talked about how he is wondering if his directories were actually a good investment. He owns a lot of them, but there’s a problem…The PR update is not coming. It’s not, I’ve decided. So, what does that mean for him?

I personally don’t think that directories are dying so much as becoming a bit different. A lot of directories made their money because of PR. A lot of us (me included) submitted to higher PR directories simply because they would help me get a better PR which in return would allow me to sell links. But, with PR not coming back, I think what will happen is people will start removing a lot of those directories. A lot of people would make about forty directories and try and get them all to PR4 and then sell links on them for cheap to maximize profits. That won’t happen anymore.

What will happen is people will make one or two directories. They will get a lot of traffic pumping to them and that is what will become the new directory. Rather than PR being important to webmasters, what will matter now is how much traffic that directory gets. And since it will be so important to push traffic to each directory, they won’t be able to run as many of them. I think that this will destroy a lot of directories, but I also think that it’ll do a lot of good for the market. The fewer the directories, the better each one will be. And that is important in my opinion.

Is AGLOCO going down the drain? I ask this because fewer and fewer people are mentioning it on their blogs or the forums. I mean, I wrote a post about some FAQS of Agloco on DormEarning, but that’s only because I don’t want it to be an idea that just dies out. I was loyal to AGLOCO back in November and as we come up on the year mark of its existence, I am still loyal.

I remember when John Chow used to constantly write about AGLOCO. Now he doesn’t even mention it. Does this mean that he is just bored of it or does this mean that he is finally fed up with them not paying us yet? That’s odd since, as far as I remember, he was a member of AllAdvantage and knows that they would pay. So, I wonder why he stopped writing about it. Is he tired of them or is there just no new information to mention about AGLOCO? One has to wonder…

Frankly, I think AGLOCO is just building up more for the next push. For every month that people use the viewbar, it is more hours and more money that AGLOCO is making which in turn will make us more money. I have learned some cool things about them, though, and it has turned my attention more towards the viewbar. Primarily, it’s that Google pays ten cents for every search when used by the viewbar. Do one hundred a month and that’s ten bucks into the AGLOCO pot. So, what I have to say is basic…I don’t think AGLOCO is gone and I think that if people start writing about it again, they may find more people signing up.

I got a lot responses over the past two days in regards to my post about Google Losing Control and I have to say, it brought about another question that I wanted to express my opinion about tonight. It brought me back to something I remembered when I was in my Economic 111 class (I believe that’s the number) and that was the knowledge of Supply and Demand. What does that have to do with Adsense? Take a look…

When a company can supply more product, the price begins to go down. If a company can’t provide as much product, the price begins to go up. Well, the same can be said with Google. As more people start to use the product, they can start to pay us less and less because if five or ten of us leave, it won’t hurt them as much as if ten of us left when they were small. Basically, because they have gained so much damn power and so many people WANT to use them, they can take more of the profits. The demand is so damn great for a good CPC network and the supply is not as great that they are in control. Just like if you wanted to buy a potato and there was a potato famine, the same goes for this.

So, how can we slap this around and potentially take back what is rightfully ours? That answer, my friends, is in how we display our ads. One of the first companies that we all sign up for when we make a website is Adsense. Why? Because anyone can get in and anyone can make ten cents a day doing it. Woopdi do! Anyways…Since so many people want to be in it, they can basically charge us more (take more of our money out) because they are providing us this means of making money. What if we just…removed the ads? What if instead of putting Adsense up, we threw an Azoogle Ads up? What if we just said, “screw you Google” and boycotted their company?

Google makes a lot of people money, but then there are the people that don’t make all that much money. There are the people out there that could be making more if Google was not quite so greedy. What do you think? Should we remove adsense from our sites? Digg did it. John Chow did it. Why shouldn’t we? The sooner we can break out of our shells and admit that, perhaps, Google is not the way to go, maybe we will start to make more money. Yes, I still put adsense up. Yes, I like the service. But, if we all banded together and just stopped servicing the ads, do you think that perhaps, just maybe, we may be able to get our voices heard?

Do you think that there is a possibility that Google is beginning to lose some of that power that they recently possessed when it came to Adsense? Do you think that perhaps their time has either come or reforms are going to be necessary else Google go under at least when it comes to Adsense? Part of me feels that Google is losing a lot of the power that they had once possessed simply because they are getting too greedy. The Page Rank update has yet to come, they are losing big publishers and I wonder if maybe something is going to happen in the PPC world.

Why do I think this? Well, let’s take a look at some recent events. Ebay decided to stop using Google to publish their ads. That was a big slap to Google because that was one big advertiser that was no longer advertising with them. Then DIGG decided to fire Google and hire Microsoft to service their ads. I mean, that’s a big publisher right there saying, “I’m not interested any longer.” So, that’s one big advertiser gone and one big publisher gone. But, there is more.

There are smaller publishers that are deciding that Adsense is not worth the bother anymore. John Chow decided to say Bye Bye Google and start selling more private ads in place of the old 300×250 ad he had. Granted, John Chow is no big potatoes when it comes to Google (we’re talking CNN, NY Times, etc), so Google may not feel the pain. But…What if others start to leave? What if I decide to leave? What if a load of small time publishers start to leave? There goes some of their profits for sure.

So, that leads me to my big question: is Google losing its control? I think yes. I think that Google was so worried about their big time publishers that they forgot the smaller guys. They forgot about people like me and John Chow who, while we don’t make millions a month off their program, we do account for SOME of the money. If enough of us leave, that is a chunk of their profits gone. What if New York Times leaves? That’s another big publisher that is gone. And if we all go to YPN or AdCenter, that makes them bigger and Google smaller. I think that Google needs to make some changes if they are really going to stay in control. But can they?

I believe in a very simple theory when I do work on the internet. Actually, it’s my theory straight across no matter what. My theory is very basic: be honest with the people who make you money. Now what does that mean? That means that since WE are the publishers, it is of great importance to companies to be honest to us. Don’t lie to us and definitely don’t steal our money. You’re doing us no favor. We’re doing you a favor. Without the publishers, you’d have no money. But, we could still survive because we could sell text-links or banner ads or reviews or anything else privately. So, don’t lie to us.

Unfortunately, the owners of Auction Ads seem to feel that this is a good call. On Digital Point, a thread was made about Auction Ads. You can view it here. Now, one of the members, GTAce, decided to question some of the things that were going on behind the scenes of Auction Ads. Now, if you remember, Shoemoney sold Auction Ads, so whatever I say here has absolutely NOTHING to do with him. I hear the program was exceptional until it was sold. Now, as you can see here, he has a few queries about what the hell is going on. First and foremost, why is it that suddenly, he’s made NO money? Now, it’s not that he isn’t making money that irritated the owner of Admin Fusion. It’s that the questions weren’t being answered.

Twice he submitted a ticket to the company. Now, this is the same company that owns Text-Link-Ads (I use them on this blog, but I am beginning to question whether I really want to). From what I’ve seen, they have been exceptional with their customer service. Yet, numerous publishers have been complaining about what was going on. No profits, hundreds of clicks, but no money. And when questions were asked, the company did not answer. They were either ignored or given fluff. Fluff is a bullshit (and I will curse) answer to a serious question. Did the company decide to finally start making money? If so, they ought to let the publishers know.

Personally, I think it is absolutely irresponsible of this company to have such horrible responses. Or no responses whatsoever, which really is bad. It’s one thing if one of the e-mails just goes unread. We’re all human, we make mistakes. But, if GTAce really did submit TWO separate tickets about this and instead of answering the question, it was denied that it was even happening. Now…I’ve stopped running AuctionAds because I was making crap from it. But I will say this…Honesty is of the utmost importance when you’re dealing with people who make your money. We make those companies money. We do the work, we make the money. Perhaps kicking out the middle man is a good idea. Whatever is going on…If this continues, I might question the security of my earnings on TLA and I would hate for that to happen.

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You know, one of the biggest things I was depending on for a profit this month was the PageRank toolbar update. Now I know that the toolbar update has absolutely nothing of importance to where your site ranks in the search engines, but it has everything to do when you are trying to sell links. And since ten bucks every single month comes from this blog here thanks to Medical Records Software, I have to say that the sale of links would mean a great increase of profits for me. Unfortunately, the update has not come. And part of me wonders if it ever will.

Google is obviously fed up with the sale of links. They don’t want us making money that they have no control over (yes, I am calling Google greedy) even though they sell links. Furthermore, they don’t want us to potentially skew their wonderful search engine by the sale of links. Want to know what I think? I think that’s rubbish. I think that Google needs to stop with their arrogance and allow people to do what they want with THEIR websites. If they are going to become greedier and greedier and give less money to their publishers, we need to find a way to make money elsewhere.

Now…I don’t know if this is true. I don’t know if Google just likes to make us sweat and I don’t know what the hell is going on. There are rumors that Google might get rid of the toolbar. If they do, whatever. I’ll find another way to make money. But I think since I do rely on that toolbar to make a little bit of money, it’d be nice to know what’s going on. Google says selling links is bad, but they do it. Why can’t we? Anyone got an opinion about this or am I just talking a bunch of trash?

I was thinking about something today when I was skipping all the lines at the amusement park (I got one of those flash passes). Since politics has become something of more interest for me since I am legally allowed to vote now, I have begun to ponder who I will vote for in ‘08. Will I go Democratic and vote for Clinton or Obama? Or will I go Republican and vote for whoever takes control (Giuliani I hope). And then something else dawned on me…How can I make money because of these candidates trying to make money. Now, I am not going to be making a website about it because, well, I don’t want any more websites. However, I began to think of ways on how I could make money and then I realized something.

People will Google the candidates as time gets closer and closer to try and learn about what they have to offer. By simply mentioning this opinion, I could get indexed and someone might just come across my site because of the word CLINTON. That’s pretty exciting, you know? And that’s when I realized that since this is my blog, I am entitled to post whatever I want. Like other bloggers post the most random shit, I can do the same. So, that brought upon an idea of mine…What if I were to post an opinion about politicians every once in a while? By offering it every once in a while, I could tap into a market of people that are not heavily marketed. And, since my blog is gaining notoriety and strength, it’d become easier and easier to get indexed.

Now, I am not going to do it all that often probably because this blog is about my journey to medical school. However, I answer my own question when writing this and when thinking about it. Webmasters can make a KILLING simply because of this Presidential Running. I know of websites that make hundreds and thousands a month simply because of information about the Presidential running. So, I definitely feel that there is a lot of money to be made because of this Presidential Running. Perhaps I will tap into it or perhaps I’ll get the enjoyment of seeing someone else take my idea. Either way, like people say, make money anyway possible. Here’s a massive way to do it.

Back in July, I showed my excitement when my blog passed below 600K (even though I am above it again) and mentioned the reason I thought that this had happened: the FireFox toolbar. In all of my excitement, I did not care so much about whether it was even important. All that mattered to me was that my alexa, as my traffic increased, would begin to go lower and lower because more and more people were using the toolbar. And the truth is, this really excited me. But, why did it excite me?

Sites like ReviewMe and PPP both like the user to have a lower alexa ranking. So, if your blog has a ranking of under 100K, it looks better than if your blog has a ranking under 300K or even worse. This really excited me because since the firefox toolbar was out, I would hopefully go lower and lower. But, after those first few days of excitement disappeared and reality sunk in, I began to wonder if Alexa was honestly all that important. Could a big site be a big site and still have a horrible Alexa ranking?

I came to this conclusion…If you are going to earn from PPC companies, having a high or low Alexa ranking is irrelevant. However, if you are going to use programs like Text-Link-Ads, ReviewMe, PPP, you have to realize that the better your alexa ranking, the more likely you are going to make a better profit. Alexa ranking and increase in traffic go hand in hand. Sure, Alexa may require you to have the toolbar for your ‘vote’ to count for the site’s ranking, but as more and more people get it, the differences between traffic and alexa ranking will become smaller and smaller. So, my opinion is that Alexa is important for increased profits.

I was just cruising the internet when I came across something that caught my eye: Forex. It’s basically the trading of currency to try and make a profit. Now, I was sitting there and it dumbfounded me that something like that could happen, yet at the same time, it made sense to me and I realized just how brilliant it really sounded. I mean, all I would need to do is get some money and then invest it the right way. But, I began to think to myself that if I was going to go into something so damn risky, I would need to really start doing my research.

The first thing that I did was head on over to wikipedia to figure out what exactly it was. I learned something remarkable from there. Every single day, $2 trillion is traded on the forex market. Another great thing that I learned is that, unlike the stock market, you can trade currencies twenty four hours a day, seven days a week. There are very few businesses that are like that because most take place in America and they just work from 9-5. This is a totally different business and I have to say, it is ideal for anyone, no matter the time zone.

So, that leaves me with the one question…Is Forex a good way to make money or is it something that only the elite can do? Do I need to have a lot of money to go into it or can I start with something small like $100.00 and then expand over time? I am not very smart when it comes to this and I intend on reading up on it, but any feedback would be great. If anyone has any advice they may have about this, I really hope that they can give it to me. I appreciate it and let’s hope I learn enough to make some extra cash!