Evolution of Finance in a Rapidly Changing World

Introduction

Hey everyone, this is the first post to begin a whole new string of high quality posts that are perfect for anyone who wants to get into an investor's mindset.  If you have been following this blog from the beginning, you may have remembered some of my memorable earlier posts, and my goal now is to go above and beyond and write awesome posts that will keep you coming back for more.

Whether you already consider yourself a financial guru, or know absolutely nothing about the topic, don't worry, I will keep it interesting day in and day out.

This post is just to get you thinking about the nature of finance and how you can start learning how to not get screwed by the system.  Now to begin....

E v o l u t i o n   o f   F i n a n c e   i n   a   R a p i d l y

C h a n g i n g   W o r l d

The reason why I based this post upon "Financial Darwinism," is because it is currently one of the books that I am re-reading, which I honestly think is a great book filled with a lot of interesting and thought provoking content.  If you want to check out the website, here is a link http://www.financialdarwinism.com/

If you are familiar with Darwin and his theory of evolution, then you might be wondering what the heck this has anything to do with the global financial markets........

101 Ways to Drive Traffic to Your Blog

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Unrelated (somewhat) Post - China's Hottest Teacher

Hey guys, I will be putting a lot more relevant content on this blog soon, but please bare with me for a few more days.  I am going to be playing (as usual) Virtual Stock Trading games as well as managing my own portfolio.

When I get some more posts ready, i'll post them here.  They will be related to finance and ways to keep money in your pocket.  Been spending too much lately anyways, need an incentive to save and grow my money in different ways, and blogging about it keeps my mindset a bit sharper.

Anyways, this post is about the Hottest Teacher in China.  What does this have to do with finance... Well nothing really, but in the near future the posts will have something to do with finance!

C H I N A ' S   H O T T E S T    T E A C H E R

"Almost overnight, a graceful, sweet-faced and trendy 30-year-old elementary school teacher in China has become an internet celebrity, with netizens wildly spreading her photographs and videos. She has created such a huge buzz that she has been dubbed “China’s sexiest female teacher.”

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I still have a soul (HBO Boxing)

Gave me the chills. Don't watch too many shows nowadays but this clip is definitely worth watching.

Successor to Berkshire Hathaway (Warren Buffet's Company)

FORBES MAGAZINE : HOW TO INVEST IN.....

This is big news, don't really now how I feel about it yet, what do you think?  I'll keep this post short for now, but will discuss in depth soon, I suggest you read more about it yourself, this will have a big effect on the world of finance as we know it.

Philosophy of Warren Buffet

Hey everyone, I will be working on this blog a lot more in the near future, first going to comply to Mutefox's request and write a post about the systematic failures and shortcomings of the modern financial system, but right now I am extremely tired, just wrote a new post on my principles of power blog and going to update my awesome blog with the regular awesome content.  In the meantime I'm republishing my earlier article on Warren Buffet to prepare for future articles ahead.  I got great feedback on this post from last time, and I will soon be delivering interesting and thought provoking posts that may help you keep more money in your pocket.

P H I L O S O P H Y   O F   WA R R E N   B U F F E T

I'm confident that many of you have heard of Warren Buffet, the most successful American investor of the century which earned him the nickname: "Sage of Omaha"

I'm not going to bore you with his life story, but instead focus on some of his key philosophies that made him into such a successful man.  He is still well known for his frugality despite of his incredible wealth, and even though many of us will choose to walk paths where we end up splurging from time to time, it is still important to try and be in control of money instead of it taking control of us.

 

Warren Buffet is the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway which has stock holdings worth around 125,000$ per share currently.  This may seem like an insurmountable amount of money for a single share of a stock, but the point i'm trying to show here is that disciplined investors over time can actually grow their portfolio to a point where they can consider purchasing monstrously expensive (or potentially inexpensive) stocks.

“

I don't have a problem with guilt about money. The way I see it is that my money represents an enormous number of claim checks on society. It's like I have these little pieces of paper that I can turn into consumption. If I wanted to, I could hire 10,000 people to do nothing but paint my picture every day for the rest of my life. And the GDP would go up. But the utility of the product would be zilch, and I would be keeping those 10,000 people from doing AIDS research, or teaching, or nursing. I don't do that though. I don't use very many of those claim checks. There's nothing material I want very much. And I'm going to give virtually all of those claim checks to charity when my wife and I die. (Lowe 1997:165–166)

”

From a NY Times article: "I don't believe in dynastic wealth", Warren Buffett said, calling those who grow up in wealthy circumstances "members of the lucky sperm club".  Buffett has written several times of his belief that, in a market economy, the rich earn outsized rewards for their talents:

“

A market economy creates some lopsided payoffs to participants. The right endowment of vocal chords, anatomical structure, physical strength, or mental powers can produce enormous piles of claim checks (stocks, bonds, and other forms of capital) on future national output. Proper selection of ancestors similarly can result in lifetime supplies of such tickets upon birth. If zero real investment returns diverted a bit greater portion of the national output from such stockholders to equally worthy and hardworking citizens lacking jackpot-producing talents, it would seem unlikely to pose such an insult to an equitable world as to risk Divine Intervention.

”

This was the first book I read related to investing early on in my high school years which introduced me to the underlying theory of investing.

NEVER LOSE MONEY

General rules

• Rule No.1: Never lose money. Rule No.2: Never forget rule No.1.

• It's far better to buy a wonderful company at a fair price than a fair company at a wonderful price.

• You're neither right nor wrong because other people agree with you. You're right because your facts are right and your reasoning is right—and that's the only thing that makes you right. And if your facts and reasoning are right, you don't have to worry about anybody else.

• Our favourite holding period is forever.
  
  
  • Letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders, 1988

• When a management with a reputation for brilliance tackles a business with a reputation for bad economics, it is usually the reputation of the business that remains intact.

• Risk comes from not knowing what you're doing.

• If you don't know jewelry, know the jeweler.

• If you don't feel comfortable owning something for 10 years, then don't own it for 10 minutes.

• There seems to be some perverse human characteristic that likes to make easy things difficult.

• One's objective should be to get it right, get it quick, get it out, and get it over... your problem won't improve with age.

• A public-opinion poll is no substitute for thought.

• In the insurance business, there is no statute of limitation on stupidity.

• If a business does well, the stock eventually follows.

• The most important quality for an investor is temperament, not intellect... You need a temperament that neither derives great pleasure from being with the crowd or against the crowd.

• The future is never clear, and you pay a very high price in the stock market for a cheery consensus. Uncertainty is the friend of the buyer of long-term values.

• We will only do with your money what we would do with our own.

• Occasionally, a man must rise above principles.

• It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently.

• Of one thing be certain: if a CEO is enthused about a particularly foolish acquisition, both his internal staff and his outside advisors will come up with whatever projections are needed to justify his stance. Only in fairy tales are emperors told that they are naked.

• When asked how he became so successful in investing, Buffett answered: we read hundreds and hundreds of annual reports every year.

• "I never buy anything unless I can fill out on a piece of paper my reasons. I may be wrong, but I would know the answer to that. "I'm paying $32 billion today for the Coca Cola Company because..." If you can't answer that question, you shouldn't buy it. If you can answer that question, and you do it a few times, you'll make a lot of money."

• You ought to be able to explain why you're taking the job you're taking, why you're making the investment you're making, or whatever it may be. And if it can't stand applying pencil to paper, you'd better think it through some more. And if you can't write an intelligent answer to those questions, don't do it.

• I really like my life. I've arranged my life so that I can do what I want.

• If you gave me the choice of being CEO of General Electric or IBM or General Motors, you name it, or delivering papers, I would deliver papers. I would. I enjoyed doing that. I can think about what I want to think. I don't have to do anything I don't want to do.

I hope this helped you get an idea of what the nature of my blog will be in the next couple of posts.

Ideally I want to talk about the different tools investors use to achieve success when starting their portfolios, and maintaining them after they have achieved some level of success.

I hate to admit that I myself have not been especially prudent with handling my money, and thus I am writing this blog for myself as well as anyone who is interested to help them keep focused and actively make their money work for them instead of working so hard for it.

Again thanks for all the positive comments and to all new followers, please feel free to post your own opinions and things you would like to see me blog about in the future.

Happy blogging

Question to all my Blog Readers!!

Hey everyone, I would like to get this blog alive and kicking again like the golden days last month.  I noticed my viewership in this blog has dwindled as of late, and I will soon remedy that, but first I need to ask you this:

What do you want to read and learn about in this blog?


I'm open to all ideas, I have been having a bit of a writers block regarding this blog since i'm not 100% sure in which direction I want to take it.  I'm not a guru or anything, but I do spend a lot of time reading and studying a broad selection of financial topics, business, and macro/micro economics.



Some ideas I have but not limited to are:


1.) Discussing select stocks, from penny stocks to large-chip stocks

2.) Discussing currencies, commodities, and futures


3.) Real Estate/Property Investments

4.) Select Discussions on Companies e.g. My Apple post

5.) ?????????????????????????????????


Thanks in advance, happy blogging

Warren Buffett: How to Read Stocks

Hey everyone, here are some Warren Buffett videos that I found to be fairly interesting to watch.  There are a tremendous amount of videos on YouTube, and I believe that even though there is information overload, if you are focused and direct in your learning, you can basically do anything nowadays.

The difficult part is managing your priorities, getting organized, and following through.  I share these videos because I have read many of Buffett's annual reports, watched his interviews, and also read his biography, and am always impressed by his investing style and constant success.

I hope you find these videos interesting, i'll be updating this blog more so after my midterms are done!

Sex Sells, and The Future

Hey everyone, haven't gotten the chance to update this blog due to the busyness of school, and usually this blog takes the most thinking for me, so i'm sorry to say that i've neglected it a bit.  Make sure to check out my other blogs if you haven't already, i'm going to try and spend some more time on my blogs and getting the website up and running in the near future.

Now, tonight, i'm going to make up for it by writing an interesting post on my personal views on how the concept of "sex sells," is going to change in the next few decades.  This is of course, a very broad topic, but one that I am sure you are all interested in.  If life is a game, then the winners are the ones who "have sex" and have kids, and whatever else that makes you happy.

S E X   S E L L S ,  A N D   T H E   F U T U R E 

Sex In Advertising

It's no secret, sex sells, and companies have been exploiting this fact for over a century now.  Since the late 1800's, companies began to realize that they could throw in sexually provocative messages in their products and it would start selling even more.

Whether it be beer, fast food, cars, electronics, Japanese anime, you name it, sex sells, always has, always will.  Sure you don't NEED sex to sell your product, you can find another gimmick or utilize a different strategy to generate your sales, but there is  no doubt that it is one of the most effective strategies being used over and over again in most societies.

The Ironies of Sex in Advertising

It may be slightly ironic to imagine the advertising campaigns a few decades ago, that featured a nurse smoking a pack of Camels.  It is even more ironic that a product specifically designed for women would become even more popular with men, revolutionizing a whole new niche in product advertising.  Smoking has been attributed with a lot of terrible, cancerous diseases and maladies but somehow, with the help of sex, millions of people around the world became addicted to this small cylindrical product.

Sex In Advertising Today

Today, sex is used to sell beer, books, bongs, Benz's, and any product from any letter of the alphabet that you choose to name, not just "b's."  Imagine the standard beer commerical, which focuses 10% on the "beer" aspect, and 90% on the extremely beautiful women in skimpy clothing running around with a bunch of average Joes.  Sex sells because it is what we want to see, and is more likely to leave a lasting impression in our brains than just simply showing the product as it is.  No one would buy your brand of beer if you simply advertised the product as it is, since beer is boring, unless there are "sexy people" around to enjoy it with you.

Currently, it does not seem like the trend is slowing down, and instead, only getting bigger. (no pun intended)  The internet porn industry has grown rapidly since the speed of the internet only keeps increasing while the quality of videos is a lot higher.  Likewise, we are witnessing a revolution in the way we feel about our media, with internet marketing growing faster than ever imagined.

The Future of Sex in Advertising, and the Media

This is the start of a trend that will continue to lead us into the future.  It is likely that we will be seeing 3D ads on our computers and television screens, giving companies more chances to interact on a more personal level with each consumer.  There will also probably be whole new products and services offered to cater to the endless sexual desires of the human mind, whether it be in robots, virtual reality, or many more.

What is considered radical and unlikely now, which encompasses much of what we actually have today, is likely to transcend into the future.  There is no doubt in my mind that these companies are going to continue to use sexually suggestive material to sell stuff to our kids and so on.

Even in the media, SEX controls everything, seriously, JONAS BROTHERS, JUSTIN BIEBER

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JAILBAIT? I'm not the only one that sees this am I?  Are Disney and Mickey Mouse trying to sell sex to OUR kids?  Probably, the South park episode on it is pretty funny too!

LG phones for little girls, with really hot models advertising the phones in some sort of slutty pose.  Sure, why not, give them the idols they want, and let them fantasize about what they will grow up to be like.  Hey, its been working for decades, why not ride the gravy train even further.

The Point of this Post

So whats the point of this whole post?  Well its pretty simple, if you want results, add some sort of sexual innuendo in your products or campaign and see a spike in results if you apply the rules properly.

What are the rules?  Well it ties in with the Principles of Power that I talk about in my other blog.  Basically, you can't be too offensive, and learn where to draw the line between what is "acceptable" to society.  If you overstep your bounds, you might be found rude and abrasive, which would then jeopardize and tarnish your reputation.  

You have to create a smokescreen, not do it deliberately, but kind of slip it in here and there without drawing too much attention to it.  The subconscious probably sees and processes a lot of this information without actually realizing that it has already created a profound effect on you and whoever else may have watched it.

Facebook > Google

http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/02/facebook-bigger-google/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+Techcrunch+(TechCrunch)

Great read.  I watched the Social Network movie yesterday and was really impressed with the production values and humor they injected.

I found the article above to be very interesting and informative.  Perhaps one day a blogger will create an idea that will rival or surpass Facebook.  If the future is a riddle, maybe it's time to start coming up with our own answers.

The Importance of Outsourcing and why YOU should do it

Good afternoon, haven't updated lately but I'll make up for it with an interesting post today about:


"The Importance of Outsourcing and why YOU should do it"


I hope you like the new layout for my blogs, I made the changes to reduce lag and make everything more visible, crisp, and sharpened looking.  Thanks for all the great comments, i'll be working hard soon after in replying and reading your blogs as well.

Without further ado, i'll begin....




What is Outsourcing


Outsourcing, in my own words, is basically hiring someone or letting someone do the work that you should not be focusing on, since time is valuable and you should be doing the things you are BETTER at.  Essentially, its sub-contracting work to a third party, whether it be Chinese workers packing cards for an American Casino ring, or phone companies hiring workers in India or the Philippines to complete their telemarketing aspect.


Outsourcing is a term that is frequently misused, and this is because it is a broad term and can refer to different aspects.  We won't worry about that though, this article is based purely on how YOU should do it in order to reap in benefits in your life.

What are the Benefits?


There can be a tremendous amount of benefits to both small business owners, and even larger businesses,  and even to someone who does not have a business.


If you are a great writer, but do not know how to market your writing online or to potential publishers, should you really spend hours on end trying to learn marketing?  Perhaps in some cases, it is good to have a general idea of the subject so you are not clueless, but not spend four years in university to get a degree in the field.


BUT the point of the fact is, in most cases you should find someone who can help you do the tasks you find mundane or difficult so that you can focus on what you are actually good at.


Efficiency is the key to success, and can also reduce the amount of work and stress for you.

"Fact is, you cannot do it all on your own either. No matter how much you like to think that you can do it better, faster and more efficiently than anyone else, the fact remains that you will eventually burn out. The worst number in any business is "1". Meaning, you never want to be the only one working in your business."

How Do I outsource?


You can do this in many ways, first by going online and doing research about the tasks that you might want to outsource to another firm.  These types of tasks could include: Human Resources, Accounting, Payroll, Budget, Logistics, Web Promotion, and many many more, depending on the nature of your business and specifically what aspects you want to reduce stress from.


Lets say you have a large website, with a lot of articles needing to be written, updated, commented, and more.  Would it really be worth all your time, hours a day, writing and doing everything yourself?  Even outsourcing some of the work to your pen-pal friend in Malaysia would help alleviate some of the stress from your shoulders.


Better yet, if you have a few dollars per hour to spare, you can actually find people online to do the work for you!  Of course, you get what you pay for in most cases, and hiring a 3$/hr writer from the the Philippines might not get as good results as an 20$/hr writer in California.  Some people charge based on the amount of words, and many other factors play in, but you get the idea.




Final Words


Even if you are still a student, and have yet to start or be involved with a business, learning the importance of gaining leverage through outsourcing the tasks you:

Stuff you're not good at doing or don't care for

Stuff you don't know how to do very well

Stuff you don't have time to do (since you should be busy with other things)

Anything outside of your brilliance/genius (meaning, everything other than the stuff only you can do in your business)

Thanks for taking the time to read this article, I hope you found something useful that you can apply later on in other aspects of your life!

Chinese Playing Cards Factory - Image of a Supersonic Economy

Good evening, this is a slightly unrelated post, but interesting nonetheless.  This video shows workers in China working at lightning speed, packing decks of cards.  As you may know, China has a huge labour force which makes every product you can imagine.  Many countries such as America, Canada, European countries, and many more, outsource their labour to China in order to cut costs.

In North America, a lot of our workers are spoiled, with unions, sick pay, vacation days, and more, when compared to that of China's workers, it's crazy how hard they work.  Unfortunately, since there is such an abundance of these workers, they are often mistreated and are willing to work dangerous jobs just for a few hundred dollars a month, not even a quarter or what most people in other countries would make.

China's GDP growth rate is incredible, and is creating a huge impact on global markets with millionaires being created every day.

The Chinese middle class is also growing at a rate never seen before.  Basically, there is a lot of growth and spending going on in China which is creating a lot of change in all parts of the world.  Even though there are many more billionaires being produced, most of the country lives off $3600 dollars a year or less.

What does this mean?  China has become the second largest economy in the world, surpassing Japan, and produce everything from batteries to cars, clothes to furniture, and everything in between.

Now you might be thinking, whats the point?  Basically, there are many investors that are eyeballing China as a potential gold mine.  Imagine how many houses need to be built to support the rising middle class.  As the population grows even larger, mouths have to be fed, children have to be clothed and educated, and more.

How do you invest in China's shifting economy?  There are many potential answers to that question, but somethings to think about if you are interested are investing in its industrialization, energy, and consumable commodities such as oil, copper, etc.

Do some research, a well balanced portfolio can also include assets from foreign enterprises, and there may just be a lot of potential in the future.

Interesting Stock Market Facts and Statistics

Hey everyone, sorry for not having been able to update this blog in a few days, posts usually take much longer than my other blogs to create, and I have had a lot of schoolwork to deal with.

Anyways, I will create new awesome original content in the near future, however for now, please enjoy some of these interesting stock market facts and statistics!



29 Very Interesting Stock Market Facts and Statistics!

I added some pictures as well to dist- I mean keep you interested, please check out my new blog, if you haven't already!

Principles of POWER

Author: Matthew Merriman



October 2008 has raised interest in the stock market due to widespread news coverage on the banks closing and therefore stocks falling. So to supplement your interest here are 28 very interesting stock market statistics for you!

$36.6 trillion - the estimated size of the world stock market at the beginning of October 2008.

22.6% - the biggest fall of the Dow Jones in 1 day! (1987)

15.34% - the biggest gain of the Dow Jones in 1 day! (1933)

30% drop in the market - Would mean the NYSE would close trading there and then for the day.

80% - the amount of capitalisation represented by the FTSE 100 on the whole London Stock Exchange.

400-1 - The leverage given to you by some FOREX companies!

$2000 - the initial deposit you must legally have in the US to open a margin account.

£0 - the amount of tax you have to pay on a spread betting account in the UK as its classed as gambling.

86.3% - the amount of FOREX traders that trade the USD

500% - The amount the stock market grew between 1982 and 1993 in terms of capitalisation.

1602 - the year the first shares were issued on the Amsterdam stock exchange

$11 million - the amount a company must have earned over the last 3 years to gain a listing on the NASDAQ stock exchange

83% - The percentage of wealth given away by famous investor Warren Buffet to the Bill % Melinda Gates charitable foundation

$26 trillion - The current value of mutual funds

1790 - The date of the oldest stock exchange in the US opened (Philadelphia)

143,646,198 - The volume of the most traded ETF on the US markets, SPY.

0.5% - The agreed worldwide interest rate drop in October 2008 to counteract the huge drops in shares.

GRRR - The symbol of Lion Country Safari (ok not technically a stat but worth knowing!)

24.39% - The amount lost on the Dow Jones index due the effects of World War I.

£9,600 - The amount you can earn (UK) before paying capital gains tax of 18% on stocks, better than the £5,600 income tax allowance!

0 - The amount of capital gains tax paid in Mexico, Malaysia and Barbados to name a few.

50% - A rough estimate of the rise in the share price of Apple in the aftermath of the iPhone.

1984 - The year the FTSE 100 index was introduced with a staring value of 1000.00 (6950.60, the highest value reached to date, 1999)

1 - The position of Royal Dutch Shell as the most capitalised share in the UK (Oil company, 31 Dec 2007)

1993 - The year the first ETF was introduced tracking the S&P 500

89% - The amount wiped off stocks between 1929-1932, during the great depression.

2 - The position of the Tokyo stock exchange in terms of most capitalised stock exchanges.

2008 - The year oil reached $100 a barrel

14.68% - The drop in the Dow Jones in the first half of 2008.

I hope these stock market statistics have quenched your stock market interest for now, good luck with the trading guys! Don't forget to check out my website for more information on the stock market!

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/finance-articles/29-very-interesting-stock-market-facts-and-statistics-643206.html

Making More Money From Blogging

Good afternoon everyone, writing this post a bit late because I had a really late night and ended up waking up around 2:50pm.  I'm writing this post as my own "definitive" guide at creating a generous income from blogging.  Although again, I don't claim to be a huge expert yet on the topic, I believe I can give some very useful tips that have helped me along the way, and I hope you can apply them to your blog.  I noticed I did not really get as much interest from my last blog post since there was not many direct benefits that you, the reader could apply.

I highly recommend downloading the free e-book, BBBFinalCourse (Bonafide Blogging Bucks) it has a tonne of useful information that any blogger will find highly useful.  This guide is intended for people who have already been blogging for a few weeks and are frustrated that they are not making as much income as they should for their hard work, hope this helps and you improve your blog.  If you have any additional tips, please share them with everyone too!

Step 1: Blog About Something People Care About, Make it Stand Out, and don't "overwork"

This should seem fairly obvious, but I am noticing that there are a lot of blogs that are basically mirror images or each other even though the content may be a little bit different.  Try to write in a unique style that sets you apart from other similar blog, or else you become easily forgettable and thus lose you money.

Many people can blog, but not many people can blog properly, and efficiently.  Blog writing should be intuitive to the reader, they don't want to spend that much time reading your posts if there is no direct benefit to them.

Overworking on a blog is another huge mistake for bloggers. (in my opinion)  Some bloggers spend a lot of time thinking of what they are going to write about, and then another few hours writing a long and boring blog post.  Make sure to PLAN ahead of time what you are going to write about and save them as drafts on your blog so you can go back and check on them.  Use the internet or the library to gather information, make sure you are getting your information from credible sources or your readers may start to question the legitimacy of your posts.

Tip: Try to get your readers engaged in the topic, get feedback on your posts, and always reply to every single question or comment

Step 2: Becoming Web-Savvy & Improving Your Layout

This is my main goal right now and the one I believe to be the most crucial to improving your chances at blogging success.  What do I mean by Web-Savvy?

" What do I mean by web savvy?  You don’t need to be a programmer, but you need a decent functional understanding of a variety of web technologies.  What technologies are “key” will depend on the nature of your blog and your means of monetization.  But generally speaking I’d list these elements as significant:

• blog publishing software
• HTML/CSS
• blog comments (and comment spam)
• RSS/syndication
• feed aggregators
• pings
• trackbacks
• full vs. partial feeds
• blog carnivals (for kick-starting your blog’s traffic)
• search engines
• search engine optimization (SEO)
• page rank
• social bookmarking
• tagging
• contextual advertising
• affiliate programs
• traffic statistics
• email

Optional:  podcasting, instant messaging, PHP or other web scripting languages. "

source: http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/05/how-to-make-money-from-your-blog/

There are some other things that are missing from the list but understanding these basic terms will allow you to take your blog to the next level.  This is the type of knowledge that separates the winners from the losers, and believe me, after roughly two weeks of blogging, I can already tell that at least 85% of bloggers will quit within their first month, it does some hard work and learning, but the benefits also be quite staggering.

Basically, your blog is a business, improving your layout by understand the rules will only help make your blog even better, do not neglect it and if anything, find a friend that can help you out and give you some suggestions.  There are also a tonne of useful guides out there that can help you if you are confused.

Step 3: Traffic, Traffic, Traffic, Traffic, Traffic, Traffic, Traffic.... and Traffic

Yes, traffic.  It is the single most important thing for any blogger who is serious about making some money from their hard work.  Your income is directly linked to how much traffic you receive on your website, and if you currently have around 10,000 views a month, and are making roughly 500$, imagine if you had 100,000 or even a million views.  Intrigued yet?  Also, if your blogging without adsense, make to to get it for your content and if you have a domain, for that too.

For times sake, I will leave a link here that will give you a very good idea on how to accomplish this feat.  I highly reccomend it for anyone serious about making more money from blogging.

http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/01/how-to-build-a-high-traffic-web-site-or-blog/

Step 4: Have Fun!  Show Character in Your Post, and Good Things Will Follow

Without this step, you might as well give up now.  Blogging should be a fun, a hobby that could be your job, but a hobby nonetheless.  If you are waking up thinking "God, this is awful, I need to write a blog post, it's already been two days..." Then you probably shouldn't be blogging in the first place.

I enjoy blogging, and even though I am fairly new and newbish at times, I put a lot of effort into writing these posts and still have fun at the same time.  It is important to have pride as a blogger, and not to take things too seriously.  

If anything, write a blog that genuinely benefit your reader, and they will always give you positive feedback and perhaps advice that could improve your blog.  We are still all human beings and being on the internet does not change that fact.  Remember that you are writing for your peers, and not a mindless robot spewing out information from your backside.

Final Words:

Thanks to everyone who has been supporting my three blogs during the last two weeks, your comments mean a lot to me and I am in the process of learning on how to take it to the next level.  Any tips and advice would be welcome, and feel free to post your own "steps" as a comment for other readers to view.

If you haven't already, check out my other two blogs:

Random Awesome Blog

Principles of Power

The Random Awesome blog was my first blog I started on my birthday, and has already made me a decent sum of money.

The important thing to remember is that traffic is more important than income and you should ALWAYS work on improving that first, or else your income will remain stagnant.

Hope you guys found this post enlightening,

Happy blogging!

P.S. If you like what you see here, please share with your friends who are interested, and recommend my blog to others, I would appreciate it immensely, thank you.