Make Money Online Blogs Are Boring And Repetitive
Posted on March 15th, 2008 by Jason under BloggingNo good content for the last week means someone needs to put something decent up on here, so here we go.
I’m tempting fate with this post - half, if not more than that of my readers run make money online blogs, and I don’t want to piss them off too badly, but this post had to be made. Kind of ironic, considering that I run a blog that could definitely be considered in this niche, but there we go.
Here’s the statement that this whole post is about; if you agree with it, wonderful - if you don’t, even better as I hope that’ll spark some debate, something that’s been missing on here for a while.
Make Money Online Blogs Are Not Just Boring, But Repetitive Too.
Now the second part - fine, that’s hard to avoid. With millions of blogs out there already, and more created every single second… it’s likely that even if you’ve picked the most innovative topic out there, it’s more than likely that someone else has blogged about it. However, I notice that most, if not all bloggers tend to deviate towards the same set of topics…
Here’s a little list of topics that are common in the MMO blogosphere:
- Why Entrecard is amazing for your blog / why Entrecard blows. How shitty its traffic is.
Hundreds of people have discussed this already, and those that read a few blogs in the industry are getting tired of it. Pick another topic! Entrecard, wow… it’s a traffic exchange website, something that has been done before and will be done again.
- Why John Chow Sucks/Why John Chow Kicks Ass (Or, What He Ate For Lunch Yesterday)
Okay, you love John Chow, you hate John Chow. None of us care. We know how much he’s making, so hats off to him for that - he’s not teaching us how to make it though. If we wanted to read about him, maybe we’d visit his blog?
- How to improve various metrics of your blog
Maybe talking about boosting RSS feed count, increasing Alexa/visitors to your website, getting more linkbacks. You know what? Hundreds of guides to the above three have been written about those, and most of them are probably better than the one you’re going to write, so don’t do it. Obviously if you have a blog that’s geared to other newbie bloggers go wild, but it’s unlikely you’ll be in the position to teach them about improving metrics if so. I’ve done this in the past, but it’s getting a lil tiring seeing a different guide every day, all of which say the same thing as the one I read yesterday
You know the best way to improve the metrics of your blog? Write kick ass content, then market the crap out of it. Oh yeah, maybe run a contest with a tonne of prizes not worth much so people get excited - that works too.
People read make money online blogs because they hope that they’ll be helped make money online… the thing is, no one that runs an MMO blog will directly teach you how to make money online. Why should they? The key to making money online is stumbling across an untapped market, and if someone does, they’re sure as hell not going to reveal it to you for free. This is where eBooks and membership websites (note, not launched yet so don’t signup) come into the picture - sometimes people get bored of carrying out the ideas themselves and sell them, or if there’s little competition continue to carry out the ideas and sell them too to bring in additional income.
MMO blogs however might give you basic, generic steps to make money online… the thing is, you probably would have read something similar to those tips before.
I will let you know why I read make money online blogs - to see what the owner is up to. Personally, I know that I’m not going to ‘get rich’ reading what someone else has written, as most people will not reveal their exact methods free, however the lives of people I’ve interacted with - be it friends I know personally, or other bloggers I’ve communicated with occasionally is always interesting, especially if they have an engaging writing style.
If you run a make money online blog, I want to know what YOU are doing, what projects YOU are working on and things that have worked for YOU. I don’t care how *insert A lister here* recommended *insert affiliate product here* and thus you thought it would be a good idea to do so too - if you’re talking about something, have first hand experience of it or don’t promote it to earn money off it. How do you think crap like Get Money Magnet is profiting so much? People bought into hype, and then realised it served no useful purpose whatsoever… they had to continue the hype though otherwise they’d lose money. Thankfully, quite a few bloggers that bought into it have dropped it, however there are still many promoting the ultimate legit scam (if that even makes sense)
If you run an MMO blog, but aren’t personal… people are going to leave. There is plenty of good content available elsewhere, so much so that I could stop visiting twenty of the blogs I regularly read tomorrow and still have stuff to keep me busy… the main aspect of any blog is the person behind it - without the person running it, a blog is not worth reading. Yes, you can get by on guest posts for a while, but again - if there are too many guest posts, I’m going to read their blogs rather than yours.
As for this blog, it started out as a journal detailing my attempts at making money online - sometimes amazing, sometimes pitiful. As my income swings so much, I never promised I could help you (on this blog, at least)… I do try to throw in some occasional tidbits.
Thoughts? The more, the better. ![]()
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Man you are so right on with this post! I am constantly dissapointed in reading “make money online” blogs only to read about the sites author making money, but showing no interest in showing you how he makes that money. Why have a MMO blog if your not going to instruct your readers on how to replicate your successes? Maybe just a place for the owner to gloat? Well congratulations to that owner, you make money, and the rest of us can only imagine how…. Great concept for a MMO blog.
I don’t care to read your post that your favorite burger joint is closing down, and really don’t care since you are nothing but an internet character anyway!
There are a few excellent MMO blogs out there that provide one with great information, however they aren’t always the ones you find on google page one.
TUK rocks, keep up the good work Jason.
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I agree entirely. Admittedly you do a bit of make money online, but it’s in a good way. Places like John Chow, and thousands of clones are really starting to annoy me, especially with the pain-in-the-arse ads.
It’s also rare for the techniques to work.
TUK is possibly the only blog that’s even close to MMO that I read all the time, and I’ve gotta say, it’s the best
@ egk - the gloating annoys me. I make a decent(ish) amount online, nobody really reads my blog, unless there’s something *really* good, and I don’t care. Showing off about making money is just something everyone seems to do, and not everyone actually earns that money
Great Post Jason, BTW
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“If you run a make money online blog, I want to know what YOU are doing, what projects YOU are working on and things that have worked for YOU.”
That’s just it though. I imagine that most of the people running these blogs have no experience or projects. Which is why you see the same topics over and over. Their attempt at making money is to talk about making money and hoping they can con someone into following an affiliate link.
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Thats something I found out days after i started off my money making blog and hence quitely quit posting monthly earnings and stopped boasting abt my increasing/decreasing PR every 3 months
hehe.. . . . .I did read somewhere that mmake money online blogs have the least revenue from adsense and such. . . all you can do is take the newbies for a ride!
Sorry to disappoint you. I have to agree with you.
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Geesh, no one disagrees?
Why? Do you want me to disagree?
I jumped off the criticism boat where MMO sites are concerned a long time ago and started concentrating on what I wanted to do/see.
Similar to what you said, I found a lot of MMO sites lacked personality, plus recommendations for affiliate programs lacked the depth I was looking for. So I created my own site
I agree that the MMO blogs are repetitive. Reminds me of some magazines I know. For somebody new, like me, a lot of the content is new and good. I will tell you though that it seems like everyone is writing about the same stuff. Nobody is getting into the nuts and bolts though. There’s some good content in the MMO blog community but there is very, very little good ORIGINAL content.
Let me ask this question. Why would somebody publish a MMO blog where they divulge their techniques to making money to their competition for free? Maybe I’m missing something but that just doesn’t make good business sense to me. If I’m making money online there’s no way I’m telling anybody how to do it for free. This leads to what TUK said about membership sites. If you want the no kidding nuts and bolts of how to do it you’re probably going to have to pay for it. I often wonder how the MMO blogs even make money. The people who read them are people trying to learn how to MMO. But who are those people? They’re either people who have been around MMO for a while and are trying to get just a little bit more info, or it’s the noobs trying to get started. Of those two groups, who do you think is going to be clicking on the ads, adsense, or sponsor links on the MMO sites? Probably the noobs. I don’t think you’ll see folks who are making serious money online trolling the MMO sites looking for info or posting comments. Those folks are members of, or own, paid membership communities to learn how to make money online. That said, the MMO site is likely to be run by somebody who is a member of one of these paid membership communities (or promotes one themselves, or promotes one of their friends programs) who is carving out their place in the MMO niche to go after the noobs.
I will end this by saying that I’m brand new to online money making and have no experience to base my comments above on. Just a general observation. I’ll shut up now.
I think its a necessary step for bloggers to write all of the general making money online posts. Dissing people that do this is certainly not constructive. I think that in order to successfully run a MMO blog you need posts about what systems are good/bad, what writing can do for you, etc. This is where I disagree with you (needed some controversy).
I think that what you were really trying to say, is that it is the blogs that never branch away from this “standardized format” that are killing the MMO world. We all need some original content, so it is important to have the basics, and then have something unique
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I disagree!
Happy now Jason?
Actually thing is that many people hate MMO blogs with same content and concepts, just they are not open to others and don’t share their facts.
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I’m not really sure if Ideamix counts as a blog, but I would hope that there is some value in its content and it genuinely does help people make money online….
But I agree and I really don’t like the blogs whose tagline is just like “Learn how to make money online with a 3 year old”….
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Okay, let me try and reply. This will probably be as long as the post itself…
@ EGK, agreed… although MMO blog runners shouldnt be expected to share exact success, very few of them offer methods, just how much they’re making. Which doesn’t help their readers at all.
@ George, glad you like the site. Hate the posers, although TBH if I had cheques that were so big, I’d show them off too
@ Link, perhaps… it would show though, I think as if you run an MMO blog you have to talk about money, and you only talking about what XYZ links isn’t really going to have you look very… experienced. As for the people talking without walking, will… it’ll show, again
@ Anand, I thought arcade blogs earned the least from Adsense
As for the PR, well… it is important indirectly, but personally don’t get all the hype. Ah well
@ Aleks, ah well
@ 2ThePoint, naah, just gets boring when you have loads of people saying ‘Great post’
Not that I mind
@ Brian, the main reason for MMO blogs is affiliate links - you can make money pushing products to newbies, even if those products aren’t very good/free (see Get Money Magnet/Peel Away Ads).
As for the membership sites, they kick ass… I’ll be launching one soon
@ Jim, perhaps… there should be a place on the Internet where people can go to get it all. Oooh, an idea
@ Chetan, I just jumped out of my seat, man.
@ Monty, Ideamix is more like… a directory, or a library of MMO methods online, rather than a blog. As for the age, you just gave me another idea…
A lot of Make Money Online Blogs are Copycats too. You are right, it is very repetitive and not very original.
http://theblogentrepreneur.com/make-money-online-blogs-should-all-be-killed
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Jason I disagree. Some Make Money Online blogs serve as a source
a blog and have so many readers etc.,
of inspiration. You wonder if your own countryman/whatever can
accomplish this you too can.
Take yourself as an example. Some months ago you would have
called a fellow crazy if he said that you might become a good internet
marketer and learn how to design
For eg blue hat seo blog is a no nonsense blog which does not have
any personal touch but has a loyal following.
Having said that majority are crap and feeding on the newbies.
That’s why probably I did not make my blog a complete MMO. It’s about how to make life colourful and making money is part of it
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well, your words struck some questions into my head, am i blogging the correct way? How to improve various metrics of your blog, i had been blogging about this recently..
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@ Bill, I’ve read a few of your posts in the last couple days, not that one. It’s a good read! Shame I didn’t see Garry Conn’s earlier too, would have been interesting to reply to that
@ Chenzen, yes, they’re inspiring… but one big cheque to me is the same as twenty big cheques, as sadly they aren’t mine
For inspiration, check out s.eriously.com
Btw, BlueHatSEO.com redirects to WhiteHouse.gov for me, don’t know why :S
@ LiC, making life colourful should be the ultimate goal, not this MMO crap
@ Derek, as long as it’s useful, I guess it works… the thing is, I’ve seen dozens of those kinds of posts before, and that’s only within the last week.
I approve of this post.
By the way, bluehatseo.com is getting DDoS’d right now, so he’s forwarding all of the traffic to whitehouse.gov. I think that’s pretty clever.
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So instead of saying blogs are boring and repetitive, why don’t we get more solid content from you?
I agree with you that many MMO blogs are boring and repetitive. Too many. I especially hate those of them which promises that you can get rich in 2 days without any effort. But too many people want to earn many without doing anything. That why, in our MMO blog (oh, yes, we have one, we are as guilty as charge
) we try a different approach: we try to teach people that they have some work to do in order to earn some money, we try to present as good as we can different methods of making money online, with goods and bads, with our experiences included. Not all the methods are suitable for everyone, that’s why we want to present as many methods as we can (like a catalog/guide of making money methods tried by us), for people to decide where to choose from.
Btw, I like the MoneyMagnet toy, even if it is the useless tool I’ve ever seen
And btw2, I hate those landing pages, with red titles and 100px font-size, which promise us the Eden in 2 days with 2 clicks and $500 spent (this is a little bit offtopic, but I had to say it).
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Everyone speak about making money online. The techniques are totally repeating. Each MMO blog will start its theory by telling about the contests, which everyone has read before and not interested in reading the same part…..
We need some change in stuff, yes, we need innovative ideas to make real money online which even helps beginning bloggers to monitize their site whose ranking is not so good……
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I agree with the major points about stuff being boring and repetitive, but what do you expect?
I started my blog as a “money making blog” in the first week and decided I’d switch course quick. I’m sure as hell not going to be sitting and typing what it is that gets my bills paid and my gas tank filled… so I ended up writing about things I actually care about–domaining news. I DISAGREE with your point when you say don’t talk about how to get alexa visitors etc. only because you need to remember that when you start a blog you NEED content anyway you can–ESPECIALLY when starting off new. This content–regardless of what it is–is going to jump start your blog in the long run with search engine traffic. Who cares what people talk about. If you notice the people that get traffic to their blogs talk about what they want to talk about while others blog about the same shit others blog about just so they can hopefully catch some traffic from search engines.
Alright getting a bit crazy with my post, but hopefully I made some sense! Not going to re-read this post, just going to post it as I typed it!
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I find this post kind of funny - considering you pretty much ripped apart your own shit.
what content have you provided on here that is original? This is not a “Make Money Online” blog, because …you don’t even make money online! If you are not making ATLEAST $100 a day - then you ARE NOT MAKING MONEY ONLINE. You have not shown your readers any method to make a legit amount of money online, and the ideas you do present , are the same old weak rehashed ways.
Your whole blog is based on improving your RSS count by throwing these contest , the same kind of contest everyone else tries to run.
In short - You had some balls writing this post, and you better start bringing something to the plate from now on. And for anyone planning on running your own “make money online” blog, please for the love of god make sure you are MAKING MONEY ONLINE before joining the flock and wasting our time.
Sadly I still visit these blogs and make more money online then most the people trying to help me - and I am sure as hell not going to make a blog on it.
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Hear hear! THat’s the exact model I’ve been following. I give examples, personal examples or examples from people I’ve known a long time in forums.
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Whew, people that disagree
@ Geoff, ouch, didn’t know that. The Whitehouse can’t be too happy, though
@ Daniel, ouch… one will be working on that over the next few days, I promise
@ Sammy, perhaps I’ll have to concede the point that newer on, one must repeat quite a bit of the regular sh!t. The problem is, that Newbie A takes a post he read on Newbie B last week, rewrites a couple sentences, and passes it on as his own. No opinion involved whatsoever.
As for your blog, it kicks ass. But then again, it’s you talking about what you know, so it probably will
@ Austinloid, the thing is that I never claimed I would teach people the way to make money online. I originally started this off to compete with a few friends, at a time when all of us were making a net loss per day, had no experience whatsoever and decided to have a friendly competition to see who could do best.
This is more a personal blog, documenting my attempts to make money than one that will teach you step by step what to do. I have shared interesting things I have found, mainly because a lot of my readers are new and would find it useful; however, the main point behind this blog is personal opinion with regards to trying to MMO - I hope that all of my posts have shown that.
What I’m talking about is the average MMO blog with two readers, ‘Make Money Online With XYZ’ in the title, professing to teach ways that they know nothing about, and claiming they’ve done well with it, or hyping it up just to get affiliate clicks and signups. Going the way on John Chow in that respect.
As for $100 a day, how is that a suitable amount to say that someone is ‘making money online’ ? $100/day in a regular work day of eight hours is $12.5/hour… people should aim higher. The amount you ’should’ make to consider yourself making money online can be as low as $100/month, something that people with long days at work and bills to pay would be extremely thankful for. Whereas those ‘truly’ making it would say you’d need to make more than $10k/month to be considered someone that makes money online
As for me making money online, I have hit $100/day… for an extended period of time (over a couple of months) too. The problem is those earnings weren’t consistent, and that they largely depended on various factors. Something I’m looking to fix, in getting into affiliate marketing… we’ll see though
@ Crystal, likewise, I hope :).
Sweet discussion!
Funny but the money making niche is the most competitive.
Most of the blogs that are made focus on money making
you’re indeed right.. the ones who really make money does not really tell exactly how they make it..
Even if I’ve subscribed to comments, I didn’t receive any notification. It’s just me or it is something wrong with your plugin?
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I do agree with you.In most on these sites you get almost same programs. But they all do not have that appeal.Only some have.
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It is true that make money blog is a bit boring that why sometimes you will need to post some funny post.
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It’s the same with all important niches. Some people make money online and the crowd flocks to mimic their success. we have way too many clones and too few people who actually know what they are doing. I also consider them to be repetitive and “beat ’round the bush” so to say, but they keep on making these blogs in the hope they’ll strike big money.
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Many people earning money online, but not many of them are willing to share tips.
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I have an MMO blog and I realized - it’s not for me. While I do try to tap into non-website money methods, I realized it’s hard to come up with content no one else has.
That’s probably why I started an education blog. I get to talk about my personal experiences and thoughts on school techniques. Perfect- something that isn’t overdone that I won’t ever run out of topics for.
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I enjoy the MMO blogs. I think it just comes down to personal preference. I agree that no one really will give away their secrets, if they are actually “making it.”
I try to treat MMO blogs as a work of fiction; a good story. In fact I will only read the blogs that seem like they have been written by someone with no real writing experience. I really hate the “technical step-by-step boring as a goldfish and pain as a papercut” style blogs. I just think that if you are going to write an MMO blog, make it personal and enjoyable, otherwise it’s just another “click my affiliate link” blog
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yes they are boring and everybody copy each other’s strategy including design, ad prices, topics etc.
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They are beyond boring. There’s a billion Make Money Online sites for every decent site with information.
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Well, I started my own because I want to keep the worms and bacterias in my intestines alive
.
But realizing that the best way to fulfill my needs is by fulfilling others first, I gear my posts toward how they can help people MMO, not just announcing a startup review , a WP release or telling stories about my vacation.
If I did a story on my trip, I’ll add how people can make money out of it!
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@Link:
Yeah, I agree. Eventaully, they are going to fade away in time. Unless they realized the right direction to go to.
Louis Liem’s last blog post..PageRank Update - HomeBiz Resource Rakes 4 from N/A!
MMO blogs doesn’t need to be talking about monetizing a blog. MMO blog is a “blog” about “Making Money Online”. That means, ways to make money online, and those aren’t just by blogging.
Lotsa other ideas out there, building a niche site, getting into online forex trades, GPT programs, freelance writing, you can even earn money with blog contests like Jason’s here! (I hope this comment gives me an extra entry
)
Louis Liem’s last blog post..PageRank Update - HomeBiz Resource Rakes 4 from N/A!