Martin Lewis' Money Diet

It is nearly impossible to live in the UK without knowing who Martin Lewis (“the money saving expert”) is. I count myself as one of his million fans who follow him series after series of his successful tv programs “Make me rich” and the latest “It pays to watch!”.

If you need to sort out your finances his book is for you. In his particular style Martin advises on how to save money still keeping your lifestyle. The book is full of practical advice, easy to understand even if you don’t have a clue about your numbers.

His advice covers topics such as how to organise your credit cards, get the best mortgage deals, pay the bills and find the cheapest utilities’ companies, which banks to use. According to the printed book it can help an average family to save up to £6000 a year and, in fact, in some cases I can believe it.

Martin Lewis talks about “forgetting our loyalties” How many of us stick with the same provider without checking the competition just because it is easier, comfortable or because we have always been with that company? Yes, most of us. Martin Lewis makes a wakeup call to check the competition and to keep slashing the bills.

Have you ever heard of “Pay back sites”? so many of us hadn’t. Martin advices on sites where you can get the service you where already going to pay for, but in this case “being paid for taking it through this websites” in other words “they actually pay you back, part of the money you were going to spend anyway”.

The Money Diet: The Ultimate Guide to Shedding Pounds Off Your Bills and Saving Money on Everything! is a book you just can't afford to miss. The author is awesome regarding his professionalism and his practical advice (the guy knows his stuff). His website has over one million visits a month, can you beat that? There is nothing more you can add until you read the book and you tell us how much how you saved this year. Go for it!

Kontera ContentLink, an alternative to Adsense

Fortunately, there are still a few alternatives to Google Adsense in the market. The first one is Kontera ContentLink.

Kontera ContentLinks is in some ways similar to Google Adsense. You have your adverts in your website and you earn each time a visitor clicks on them.

To sign up with them is very easy and actually my account got approved and everything up and running in no time at all. They will give you the code that then you placed in your template and the adverts will appear after a few hours. In theory, the adverts are related to the content of your website, which most of them are, however the practise is that it is not always the case.

What makes different Kontera from Google is that actually the adverts are links placed inside the content of your posts (they are the ones with double underline). They are not as visible as Google adsense or other adverts are (although you can change the colour to make it more or less visible). However, the real advantage is that they are exactly where the visitor is focused on, the text. This innovative way of placing the adverts is what makes Kontera so successful and according to some publishers so easy to build their income.

Although Kontera minimum payment is set up exactly at the same amount as Google it seems that is not as hard to build the amounts little by little with Kontera, and, with all the rumours about adsense accounts closed for no reason, at least you don’t put all your eggs in one basket.

Searching for alternatives

I had so much hope of making money with paid reviews that when I made the decision of not taking part on it, I went through a really bad time. As I keep repeating in my head “where there is a will, there is a way”, I have decided to keep my mind in a positive state, so I have been making lists of other alternatives I might have at hand.

The first one was to add, at least, one site more so I double the chances to get some money that will help towards my debt.

The second one was to do as much as I could regarding Marketing (with the little time that I had). This has brought more visitors to the sites, therefore adding to the chances of the site becoming more popular.

These days I am checking into alternatives to Adsense, it seems very clear that Adsense is the clear path for so many people, however you have to have a serious number of visitors (and “click throughs”) to make the mark in which you would be able to collect the money through your paypal account, and that might seem eternally slow. So lately, I am considering the possibilities of looking for some sponsors that would like to advertise in the website and receive certain amount of money at the end of the month. Well, I will keep you posted on that.

In the meantime, feel free to share some ideas. What alternatives do you find more efficient than Google Adsense? What do you do to monetise your website?

Monetise your blog

Since I read Multiple Streams of Internet Income I felt somehow inspired and back on track again. Trying to follow its advice I have been building a new blog and filling it up with content these days. I have added adsense and left it there for now (well, of course I keep updating it). Unless the products on your website are really good, chances are you will not be able to make a living on it, at least, not with one blog. There are some niches that have good chances and if you are a geek and your website has LOTS of visitors you might stand a chance. Mine is still starting and most days I don’t get more than 50 visitors.

Another important factor, I have realised, is Marketing, in my case it is everything. As the site is not well known I don’t get too many recommendations by word of mouth yet, that is one of the reasons I have inserted a “Subscribe button”, although people might like what they see, they wouldn’t remember in a few days time your website’s address, however, providing a “Subscribe button” you give them chance to get updates every time straight in their inbox. Is there anything easier than that?

Submitting articles to directories, submitting your site to search engines, are different forms of marketing that will bring visitors to your website, the best part of it is that they are free, at least until you have some spare money to spend on Google campaigns and you decide to pay and put some ads up on other sites, but for that there is still a long time.

Dave Ramsey’s Total money makeover

I just decided to include a second review that might help some readers to give that important step and kick into action.

The Total Money Makeover: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness is a step by step book that will guide you through the process of becoming debt free. The book offers a complete plan to get out of debt and achieve your financial goals. It includes useful worksheets, charts and graphs to follow the seven steps plan of this financial guru.

For those, that find their way hard and become discouraged, the book comes full of inspiring stories from people like you who either are on their way or have succeeded following Ramsey’s plan. If the label “financial book” turns you off, this book is the exception.

The book is easy to read, easy to understand, full of useful strategies and solid advice with a common sense approach. It is so encouraging that so many have already turned their lives around following Dave Ramsey’s advice.
Dave Ramsey (radio talk show host, bestselling author and exceptional financial guru) will give you the push that you need to get into action and accomplish your goals.