Digital Point: My Happy Place

Yesterday, I had a brief lull in the day, giving me an opportunity to continue my online earning efforts. I decided to use my time posting to a couple message boards. Seeking some constructive feedback and a quick traffic surge (something better than the traffic I've been getting from my so-called "friends" on Facebook), I searched "Webmaster Forum" in Google, and second on the SERP was Digital Point. Sweet sweet Digital Point. I've found myself seeking info on DP (hehe...DP) a few random times in the past, but I never took it a step further and signed up for an account - once again, I'm slow to recognize a great thing sitting right in front of me - retarded.

I had a quick and easy plan to just hop on, make an account, and post a link to the blog, asking for feedback. It's becoming continuously clear to me that there's no quick and easy way to make money online. The plan was immediately thwarted when I discovered that one must meet a 10 post threshold before they can post a direct link on the forum. "Funky butt lovin'!", I thought to myself.

Don't worry though - this story has a happy ending. The chore of hitting the 10 post mark quickly became a pleasure. I'm sure a million better men before me have blogged about the wonders of Digital Point, but I truly don't care.

Digital Point is a playground for Internet attention whores like myself - I'm sorry everything I say has to be coupled with a metaphor for prostitution. On DP, you can get advice, give advice, trade links, trade ideas, get reviews, advertise your products...all in the good name of getting your brand out into the public eye (and just as importantly, Google's killer robot eye!). I got caught up in several discussions on increasing site earning potential, but three things in particular stood out that I'd like to focus on.

Ezine

Ezine is a massive article directory boasting a freakish amount of user generated content. Although they don't offer any direct revenue-sharing programs with basic accounts, the real pay-off comes from the traffic they send to your site (so I've heard). I read up a little on Ezine, and they've been around since 1999 publishing articles in every niche imaginable. Apparently, there was a time when linking a solid Ezine article to your site nearly guaranteed you a spot at the top of the Google SERP. Although they don't pack quite the same punch in today's game, there are still plenty of people who have nothing but good things to say about Ezine's results.

My wife recently wrote up an additional, more comprehensive guide to finding a good music therapist. This time, instead of posting the new article to eHow, I decided to post it to Ezine, linking it to the original eHow article with some keyword-rich anchor text. It typically takes 5-7 days for an Ezine article to be reviewed, but I'm anxious to see if it has a significant effect in the earnings and traffic/SERP categories. I'll be sure to let you know.

Youtube

Lots of chatter concerning Youtube optimization on Digital Point forums, and rightfully so. You can get an absurd amount of immediate exposure with the Youtube viral video equivalent of a sneeze. With just a slight bit of effort, you can easily transform that exposure into site traffic. Believe it or not, I've actually had small success with Youtube optimization strategies in the past:

Once upon a time, I ran a site called Gluttonforum, a magical place where fans of extreme eating and drinking could go to watch videos featuring practitioners of the deadly sin. A couple years ago, when I started the site, I filmed about a dozen or so videos of myself performing whatever gluttonous feat I could handle. Perhaps my most successful video, at 55,000 views, which still receives ~100 views a day, is titled Super Irish Car bomb. In this, my proudest moment, I took three shots of whiskey, three shots of Irish cream, dropped it in two pints of Guinness, and sent it down the hatch. Needless to say, Gluttonforum wasn't very successful (it's still live if you're bored), but any success it had was attributed to Youtube.

Seeing everyone on DP fuss about the power of Youtube made me realize that there's really not a whole lot stopping me from putting out a few more videos to bring in some extra traffic, and much needed revenue. I'm not promising any Super Irish Car Bomb caliber performances, but I'll try to brew something up in the near future.


Creating a Social Network Site

Finally, and damn it's getting late, a lot of cats on Digital Point are out there promoting not only their own blogs, but their own social networks as well. Although I'm no CMS (content management system) wizard, I can definitely cook something up on a nice open source platform like Elgg, Drupal, or Joomla. The original Gluttonforum (there were two phases - neither made it a month of consistent updates) was built on Joomla with an added extension called Community Builder, which is absolutely loaded with customizable features like message boards, user profiles, group support...incredibly powerful and intuitive for a free application.

I have a couple social network ideas in mind, but I'm held back by their initial start up costs. I can get economy hosting through GoDaddy for around $4.00/month, or unlimited bandwidth hosting through Bluehost for $8.00/month, but even considering those relatively small amounts, I'm in the hole as it is. To compromise, over the next couple months, I'll build a local site on my machine here at home, send it through the ringer, let some friends try it out, and if I'm convinced I can at least make enough to cover hosting fees, I'll breathe some life into it. As with everything else, I'll keep you updated with my progress.

I know I hammered out a lot of words tonight, but I feel I'm missing content worthy of teeth sinking. You'll have to forgive me - being retarded is taxing.