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Who’s idea was it for the mailman to not deliver door to door anymore? One of the first things I noticed about living in Seattle is that the house doesn’t have a mail slot. Instead, the mailbox is on the street with a bunch of other mailboxes. This saves the mailman time and I guess the post office money since their people don’t have to walk as much.

Normally, walking to the mailbox to pick up your mail isn’t a problem. However, my driveway is a quarter mile long and getting the mail is like doing a morning workout. I guess I could drive but then I would feel silly telling people I have to drive my car just to get the mail. Maybe I can use the 1/4 mile driveway as justification for buying a Segway. Think the wife will go for it?

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The global web

The Web, by its very definition, is global – which means anyone from Boston to Beijing could access your carefully crafted web pages. Nothing new there then.

But the ever-increasing globality of the internet raises an interesting question for the millions of bloggers out there. As online populations grow at a much greater rate in developing countries than in, say, North America and Western Europe, there’s a mounting case for making blogs available in multiple languages.

Whether that involves using automated ‘machine’ translation or a good old-fashioned humanoid is up for debate. But regardless of what markets you’re planning on targeting or the mechanisms that will help you achieve it, there are a number of steps you can take to make the conversion process a whole lot easier further down the line.

Language length

One of the main issues thrown up when working between languages is text-length – a French text is on average a third longer than the equivalent text in English. And German too tends to dwarf its English counterparts – Büstenhalter is ‘bra’ and Geschwindigkeitsüberschreitung is ‘speeding’.

Conversely, many Asian languages require less space than English to convey a message. By way of example, the word ‘information’ requires a mere two characters in Japanese.

What this all means for you, the blogger, is that you may have to adapt the space to fit the translated text.

The easiest way of doing this is to ensure your content and design is kept separate. So, without meaning to get too technical, don’t hard-code widths to elements that hold text – you should allow the words to flow, expand and contract as required by the language. Cascading style sheets (CSS) ultimately keep content and design apart, which means each translated page won’t have to be re-designed from scratch.

Design considerations

Language aside, there are a number of other considerations you can make early on that will make converting your blog for other cultures a breeze.

For instance, don’t insert text within an image, as it will be necessary to reconstruct the image for the target language later on. By keeping graphics text-free, you will save yourself a headache.

Also, it’s worth remembering that many countries across the world still aren’t hooked up to high-speed internet. This means that Flash animations and other bandwidth sapping graphics can take forever to load – so you may want to consider offering a ‘bells and whistles’ version of your blog and a text-only version to give users the choice.

Going local

The way you write your blog really affects who wants to read it. Even if you’re only targeting English-speaking audiences, i.e. the US, Canada, UK, Australia and New Zealand, there are enough differences in dialects and colloquialisms to mean you should try and write for as broad an audience as possible. This may just mean limiting references to local TV celebrities in your area or any other localized reference points that may amuse a reader in Los Angeles, but confuse someone in London.

Now, in terms of translation, some European blogs offer side-by-side translations of its content – one in the native language and one in the world’s most widely spoken second language – English. You must ask yourself if a similar set-up would benefit your blog?

But the practicalities of multilingual blogging may put you off. Even if you are a skilled linguist and are fluent in two or more tongues, do you really have the time to translate all your content?

The rise of the machines

The likes of Google Translate can actually be quite good for getting the general gist of a message and, if you’re not too fussy about offering 100% grammatically correct posts in multiple languages, this could be a viable option.

However, to increase your chances of hitting a passable machine translation, you must consider how you write your text in the first place. Google Translate isn’t smart enough to figure out slang words and jargon – so rather than having a ‘swell’ time you’re probably best having a ‘good’ time. And don’t eat ‘chow’ – have some ‘food’ instead.

English often uses a multitude of words to describe the same thing. For example, ‘hound’, ‘mutt’ and ‘dog’. Moreover, verbs can also be used as nouns…even in the same sentence:

“I’m going to race in a race” or “I will hammer the hammer”.

The point is, if you control your language and make sure you avoid any potentially ambiguous phrasing (and ensure one word only ever means one thing) you can learn what words machine translation tools like…and what they don’t.

If you do go down the machine translation route, you have a number of options. WordPress and other common blogging tools have translation plug-ins readily available which, when clicked by the user, translates the text into the reader’s language.

However, this option may not give you the most control. If you would prefer to pre-machine translate your blog, then it may be worth using the services of a native translator to edit/proofread the text. They can check for errors and help prevent any potentially embarrassing translations.

In effect, this method helps you preserve the creativity of your English blog, whilst also ensuring any colloquialisms or turns of phrase are suitably localized for your target market.

And there you have it – blogging for international audiences!

Christian Arno is founder of localization and language services company Lingo24. Launched in 2001, Lingo24 now has 130 employees working on three continents and clients in over sixty countries, drawing in revenue of over $6m USD.

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ShoeMoney has just launched a new three level affiliate program for his Shoemoney System and it’s pretty awesome. I have made more money with Shoemoney System than any other affiliate program. In fact, I was Shoe’s number one affiliate when Shoemoney System first hit the market.

With Shoemoney System 2.0, Shoe is really kicking it up a notch by offering you not only the ability to make money off ShoeMoney System sales that you generate but you’ll get paid on sales that affiliates that you refer generates as well!

ShoeMoney System 3 Tier Payout System

• 1st tier – You earn 40% from any sale you make.
• 2nd tier payouts – You make 15% of the sale price anyone you refers makes.
• 3rd tier payouts – You make 10% of the sale price that your 2nd tier referred.

The tiers are on the price of the sale. Not of what the affiliate makes. That means you can make from $200 to $350 per sale on the first tier, $125 to $175 per sale on the second tier and $100 to $150 per sale on the three tier. The commission range depends on what upsells people convert to.

Awesome Tracking System

ShoeMoney System affiliate program uses three levels of tracking to ensure you get credited with every sales and every affiliate sign up. First, there is tracking by cookie. In addition to the cookie, user IP addresses are also tracked. Then there is the email tracking. Each email lead refereed by you is hardcoded LIFETIME to the program. That means if they buy anything from Shoe in the future, you’ll make money on it!

The ShoeMoney Brand Is Easy To Promote

One of the reason I was the biggest ShoeMoney System affiliate was because ShoeMoney has a great brand and is so easy to sell. The ShoeMoney System is an amazing product but I am sure Jeremy is going to put out more products in the future that are as good if not better. Start getting your leads in so Jeremy can work his magic.

Your friends, piers, and users are going to hear about ShoeMoney System and it’s likely they will probably purchase it. Why don’t you get credit for it? After all, it’s free to join. Sign up now for the ShoeMoney System affiliate program and make money on not just your efforts but the efforts of affiliates that you refer as well.

Click Here To Sign Up for ShoeMoney System 3 Tier Affiliate Program

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My friends Gideon Shalwich and Tyrone Shum will be hosting a live webinar tomorrow on how to outsource all your rapid video blogging work so you can live The Dot Com Lifestyle. If you haven’t seen the video about this webinar yet, you can watch it here.

Video is a big part of my blogging set up. My YouTube channel has 657 members and over 900,000 video views. Learning how to make videos and, more importantly, how to outsource the work can really enhance your blogging. This is where the live webinar from Gideon and Tyrone comes in.

What Exactly Will You Cover Inside The Webinar?

• The problem with Rapid Video Blogging and what you must do to overcome it…
• Why outsource your video production process in the first place? Like, what’s the secret benefits that no-one talks about?
• The full video blogging production process disclosed (never seen before), and which parts you can actually outsource…
• Exactly how to set up your “remote office”…
• Where to find the right people at the right price… and FAST!
• How to communicate in the best possible way with your outsourcing staff, and the secret tools that will make your life a lot easier!
• And a whole heap more!

What Does The Rapid Video Creation Bonus Include?

To sweeten the pot, Gideon has decided to throw in a $197 bonus when you register for the webinar. The bonus is Gideon’s new Rapid Video Creation course that he have not even released yet! And no, it’s not the same as my big Rapid Video Blogging Course.

Inside the Rapid Video Creation Course, Gideon will show you everything you need to know for creating online videos, both normal as well as screen capture videos, at super high speeds. And to make it even sweeter, he’s allowing one extra license that you can use for your outsourcing person at no extra charge!

Will The Webinar Get recorded?

Yes! The webinar will indeed be recorded so that you can watch it at your own convenience in case you can’t make the LIVE call. But to get access, you will still need to register for the webinar before the deadline.

What Is The Deadline For The Webinar, And What Time Is That In My Own Country?

The webinar will be run LIVE at 8pm EDT (USA) on Tuesday, Sept 14. If you want to be part of this webinar, you need to register BEFORE this date, otherwise you will miss out. To find out what time of day this is in your own country, just use this handy page here.

But do note that Gideon will be recording the webinar and making the recording available afterward in case you can’t make the above time.

Click Here Register for The Outsourcing Webinar

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Well what I have come to realize about making money online or off is regardless of whether it is business to consumer or business-to-business, it is all about establishing relationships and building trust. Obviously attraction marketing has gained considerable speed in the most recent years. So let’s take it one step further and look at, not just making the connection, but building a trust and keeping that trust.

A few months ago, I started using Skype more and more. Yes, I was already using it to talk to my Sister in Spain and My Brother in Chicago and my Grandmother in Michigan, but there was a grander picture that I was slowly piecing together.

One day I had someone approach me (from Facebook) to be a VIP speaker for her “Skype Group”.

Skype Group? This was something new to me. I agreed, and a day later when it was time for the presentation I got on. I spoke to 25 people in this group. They all muted their Skype lines and I spoke. Now I had done Webinars on Go to Meeting before, but never a Skype presentation. It was limited in that it was simply a call. However, then it dawned on me the true power of Skype.

Not only am I able to connect with people that I thought not possible, (Tom Cruise has a Skype account, however I am referring to well established Marketers and Speakers within my Niche- such as Joe Vitale) but I could also find pinpointed groups within my niche via Skype’s search bar and join them. I could also create my own group using my own contact. I invited 50 people to join a group I created and amazingly enough, they all joined.

They were all contacts that I imported from Facebook. I then began adding to that group via Skype’s Group. Eventually I had a group of 350 people. All were on Skype and the entire group was in my control because I was the creator of the group. I could remove spammers or people that I didn’t respond, at will.

I was not able to talk to all of them because you cannot have more than 25 people on a Skype call. I was, on the other hand, able to text and instant messenger all 350 like it was a party line.

This was great because one of the initial benefits was having a group of people willing to syndicate my content and links, which drove my blog ranking and reputation up and up and up. So I could text into my Skype party line “Hey guys here is a new blog post and all 350 would read it and then put it on their sites and syndicate it. Now, mind you, not all of the 350 would be online and watching what I am texting, but the beauty of Skype is that it works like an Instant Messenger so I would get some pretty good numbers and comments to my blog.

Eventually, and the whole point of the exercise was to get those people that I met on Skype, onto my LIST.

That is what social media is intended for:

Funneling those interested people you find on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and SKYPE into your Subscriber List.

That group and many other groups since that I started, allowed me to build up a following on Skype into the thousands, which directly built up my list and eventually made me money.

I continue to make money from Skype because I am also using Skype’s functionality to keep my List and Contacts warm. I do this through actually responding to someone when they have a question or issue. I find the time to answer those calls. I can also let my Skype Contacts know when I am busy or away from my computer, or when I am welcoming incoming calls.

The more accessible you are to them, the more the relationship builds.

Relationship=Business growth.

I also do most of my business partnership connections on Skype…but that is for another discussion.

Guest Blog by Casey Zeman, www.caseyzemanonline.com.

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My friend dk is famous for doing stuff totally out of the box when it comes to marketing. He basically doesn’t believe that there is a box. Take for example the following.

dk has this “thing” going on this week connected to his thinktank that I am going to, where anyone with an internet product, service, website, blog or company can get it seen by thousands or maybe 100,000 internet marketers for possibly almost nothing.

He has a good solid following, and they are the biggest names in internet marketing. He is putting this attention he is getting up for bid on his website. There will be something like a dozen chances to have your product or blog showcased, and the bidding starts at only $1.

It is better explained on the video. For a change of pace, this video is with Cait, not Jenny.

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For this week’s Dot Com Pho, we decided to do something completely different. Instead of going to a Pho restaurant for a hot bowl of noodle, we headed to PCC Natural Markets in Issaquah for the Healthy Living Fair. PCC Natural Markets made a modest beginning as a food buying club consisting of only 15 families in 1953. Since then it has grown in strength and stature and is today the largest consumer-owned natural food co-operative in the United States, with ten locations in the Seattle area.

The Healthy Living Fair allows you to sample great-tasting groceries, organic fruit and deli-made specialties, plus natural health and body care products — all available at PCC. There were 100 different vendors on hand to share information and hand out free samples of more than 600 products, including a pizza made from tofu! If you try to eat everything available, you’ll be a stuffed organic turkey. The Healthy Living Fair at PCC Issaquah runs until tomorrow. It’s a great way to get a healthy free lunch. That is, as long as you don’t over do it and eat everything in the house.

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The above is a screen shot showing my monthly Aweber earnings from February 2009 to today. Aweber pays 30% commission on new customers that you refer to them. The key is the 30% is on the monthly billings and it continues for as long as the customer stays with Aweber. I love these types of affiliate programs because it helps build passive income. I have stated many times that passive income is the key to living the Dot Com Lifestyle.

Creating passive income requires you to think long term instead of going for the instant gratification of a one hit sale. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy getting an email saying I made a $1,000 commission on a $2,000 sale. However, I get more excited when I get an email from Aweber saying I earned 30 cents by referring a new customer to the Aweber $1 Trial.

Given a choice between getting a big one time commission or a percentage of sales for life, I’ll take the percentage every time. All those 30 cents add up! In less than two years, my Aweber earnings went from $83.35 in February 2009 to $1,646.99 so far this month. And guest what? It’ll be higher next month!

The best part is this income comes in regardless of the blog. Should John Chow dot Com go under tonight, the Aweber income will keep going. This gives me tremendous security. This security does not come over night however. It took me nearly 20 months to get it to the point where it’s making almost a full time income. The key is to keep at it and think long term. Don’t think of your blog as a get rich quick scheme. Believe me, it’s not. Think of your blog as a growing business and treat it as such.

Instead of always going after the one hit wonders, come up with a solid business plan that offers a mix of products and services that offer some kind of passive income potential. It can be slow and painful in the beginning but in the long run, it will pay off. Most importantly, it will keep paying.

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You have played that game with the gofer’s head. There are 6 holes and a gofer pops her head out and you need to hit it in the head before it scoots back into the hole. It’s a fun game that provides physical exercise, anger redirection (gofer is your grandmother), and instant gratification.

Instant gratification is a great thing. You perform a action and you receive instant reward. In the gofer game when you bop the head with the soft hammer lights flash and your score increases. Hit head, get reward – this triggers happy things in your brain so you like it and you try to hit another head.

Instant gratification can be used to do amazing things. Some guy in the 1940’s was able to make pigeons play the piano simply by giving the pigeons food every time they pressed the right key on a small piano. They were not playing Chopin but they could play a lot better then me.

Most of our body is designed around gratification. Eat something and if the body enjoys it then your brain will instantly reward you by making it taste good. Food touching your tongue makes you happy so you touch more food to your tongue.

And if you are doing something that biology wants you to be doing, like putting a thing into another thing and moving it around lots then your brain rewards you by making it feel really really good.

The lesson is clear. Biological brains are designed to respond to instant gratification. If you are doing something right then your brain makes you feel happy.

The Problem With Blogs and Their Lack of Instant Gratification

When it comes to blogs there is a problem with instant gratification. The problem is there isn’t any instant gratification – especially when you begin your blog.

You will spend countless hours building your blog. You will pay special attention to every detail. The logo must be just right, a day is spent positioning it into the perfect spot. Wording will be revised and revised. Only after many many adjustments and re- adjustments you publish the blog.

What happens? Nothing. Nobody visits your blog and the few that do could not care less about all your effort. Your perfectly placed logo. Your reference to the rare African dung beetle that took you 2 hours to research. It all goes unnoticed.

What can you do about it? Again – nothing. You dust yourself off with your head a little lower and continue. You think to yourself, maybe the gratification is just not so immediate, maybe it comes in a few weeks.

I have had my blog and website for 2 years and am still waiting for gratification. I have written over 40 great web pages. I have redesigned the layout and design of the website multiple times. I have over 50 well crafted and thought out blog post. I am still waiting for gratification. Still waiting for lights to flash and my score to increase.

Does your blog provide you with the instant gratification you crave? No? Neither does mine.

Even though the internet seems like a fast place, for most bloggers it is tearfully slow place. You design, you write, you try to please and get nothing. No gratification. Is it going to come later? Who knows? Maybe.

If you are expecting instant gratification, or even near instant then forget about your blog – go to the arcade and start bonking gofers on the head.

This post was written by Roman from How This Blog Makes Money

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Most of the people who choose to read this blog are interested in how to get out of the rat race and start working for themselves. This “dot com lifestyle” doesn’t have to be achieved through blogging, of course, so what other options do you have?

Eleven years ago, Peter Trevellian published a book called Escapology. The book has now been updated, revised and expanded for an audience in 2010. In fact, this is the tenth edition of the book and it serves as the subject of today’s review.

What’s Old Is New Again

Some people may scoff at books like that were originally published more than a decade ago. After all, things like Twitter and the Apple iPhone didn’t even exist eleven years ago. However, some of the content is “evergreen” and the rest has been updated to fit with contemporary life.

The book, which appears to be only available in e-book digital download format, spans over 400 pages and it describes various strategies of how you can “build passive streams of recession-proof income” and how you can “make insane amounts of money anywhere in the world.” We all want that, right?

Some of the e-book can be considered a tutorial or a guide, but a lot of it is based on real life experiences, not only of author Peter Trevellian, but also many of his readers, clients, and acquaintances. All in all, Escapology contains “101 easy ways to escape 9 to 5, become financially free, and have the time of your life.”

How to Escape the Nine-to-Five

The idea is that everyone is different and what may work for one person may not work for another. If you hate getting your hands dirty, a job as a construction worker probably isn’t appropriate. This is why Escapology offers 101 different methods for you to consider.

The first two chapters aren’t methods at all. Instead, they remind you that losing your job is “your lucky day” and that you shouldn’t get a job if you want to be rich. That’s because you’d still be trading hours for dollars, regardless of what hourly wage you manage to earn. Passive income streams, when implemented properly, have limitless potential.

Shown above is a brief snippet from the table of contents. You can learn how to be an Internet entrepreneur, for instance, as well as a passport broker, consultant, and a wealthy author.

Two Examples of Escaping

The actual content of the lengthy book may be interesting and valuable, but it is not without its faults. I found a great number of typos and other errors littered throughout the text, including errors in headers and titles.

Can you spot some of the issues with the excerpt above? They’re not sinful, but they do take away from the overall professionalism of the piece. Ironically enough, this is taken from the chapter for how you can make a large amount of money as a copywriter.

Instead of taking a flat fee, the author suggests that you take a percentage of the increased profit that your customers will enjoy as a result of your services. This opens up greater potential, but of course it comes at a greater risk as well.

One of the strangest methods described among the 101 strategies outlined in the book is to start your own religion. It starts off with a discussion of Jim Jones, but it goes on into how starting your own religion can be quite profitable. This reminds me of a South Park episode.

The chapter continues with a discussion on Scientology, selling inspirational books, and a career as a new age counselor. Interestingly enough, the next chapter discusses how you can be an independent missionary and earn “infinite returns on your investment.” How’s that for unorthodox?

Jailbreaking Your Life

I can’t really say whether the guidance provided in this book can be utilized by everyone, but simply exploring the different options available to you can really open your eyes to what is possible. There are chances at passive income streams all around you; you just have to see them.

The e-book is very text heavy, but it does offer some unique perspectives. From getting rich with an invention to running an import/export business, from tracing missing heirs to rock concert promoter, there is certainly quite a range for you to consider.

The e-book sells for $49.97 and comes with a 60-day money back guarantee.

CLICK HERE TO BUY ESCAPOLOGY

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