Reasons to Own and Operate Your Own Business

Years ago when my ex and I first got married we both lost our jobs and our of necessity started our own business.  Since the divorce, I have continued to have my own business and going to share reasons to own and operate your own business.

09pEvYqoSFreedom would be my first reason as being owner and operator you get to be that boss (the person everyone hates).  You get to wear many, many hats and if like me learned a lot the hard way but I would not change a thing.  You do have to find the balance in work/life and that can be hard sometimes when you are trying to build your business.

As I have gotten older, I have narrowed down my business plan to working with my traffic exchanges, mailers and doing affiliate marketing.  It’s funny how in this online world there are still people that think they know how you should run your business and like to make it public or let you know you are doing this wrong and that wrong.

Another reason that I enjoy having my own business, what most don’t realize is that this is “MY” business to run as I see fit – that is what I love about this country that gives us this privilege.  There are going to be times that people don’t agree with how I run things but it is still me that pays the bills, put in the hours, and does all the work behind the scenes and bend over backwards to make you all happy.

judgingcatWhen others like to give their opinions that is just what it is their opinion and should not be put out there as guidelines or “rules” as to how the business is run because they are not a partner nor do they pay any of the bills that go along with your business.

That is another reason that I love having and running my own business – I am proud of my online business, I work very hard in my online business and believe that I offer great services.  Over the years, I have developed many, many friends and customers and I do bend over backwards to help them and would not trade that for anything.

You know it’s funny as the more competition happens in all business these days it sure seems the more some like to try and dictate how things should be.  Having been around the small ma and pa businesses for over 30 years now, I have learned that you just can’t beat old-fashion service. You have to learn to keep your emotions under control no matter how pissed you get, how over the coals someone want to rake you, and think about what is best for the business. You are NEVER  going to make everyone happy, your are NEVER going to have everyone agree with decisions you make – but you do have that right to make them.

Does it get hard at times yes it does but I sure would not trade it as the rewards out weigh the bad – the satisfaction you get from helping others, the pride you get from seeing what you created work and people that love your business.  One of the best thank yous that a business owner can get is seeing someone else promote them and for all the pages that I have seen – I would like to say thank you, thank you, thank you.

best2And the most important reason would be YOU, I really do appreciate all of you putting up with me as I know I come up with some pretty Zaney ideas sometimes and I do love the feedback – good or bad – we keep growing the business together.  AND as always you can leave me a message in support – I do answer all my messages.

Why You Should Leave Comments on Blog Posts

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It’s interesting years ago when I started blogging cause I had no clue what I was doing and do not consider myself a writer but I was told to write as if I was talking to someone as that is really what you are doing.  Now let me tell you why you should leave comments on blog posts.

After visiting to lot of blogs and reading the content, I was always too shy to leave a comment – I thought people would think that I was stupid (which they probably do anyway, so who cares), I really didn’t know what to put as I was learning and the list of excuses goes on and on yea I had them all believe me.

I’ll go back and address the feeling stupid part – as that one is a hard one to get over but I was told by a mentor once and that has stuck with me “there is no stupid comment or question”.  If you have the question in your head and are thinking it then there is probably someone else thinking it too.  Don’t believe me type into Google Search your question or comment – you will be mighty surprised what comes up.

Now the best part about leaving a comment is the branding that you are doing and most don’t even realize that you are.  Just like anything else you do here online – you need to keep you, your services, your products in people’s face and this is great way to do this.

So you are thinking that I don’t know that much – I’m just learning well guess what you know more than the person that is joining right now or even in a month.  And yes people find these post months later and read them – in fact I have even gotten referrals from post that have been year or two old.  What better way to show others that you are out there and as far as learning – I’m still learning daily and another thing that I so enjoy about working online.

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AND what a great way to learn about others that already like the same things that you do – think about your blog as a neighborhood get together – the author has invited you and others – you all are a bunch of strangers till you start yaking with each other and find out that you have things in common.

Well this is all that you are doing when leaving comments on people blogs, you are yaking with people that you have things in common with – so don’t be shy – get out there and start yaking.

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You could be missing out on opportunities and not even know it – sometimes you meet your best friends, clients, paying customers in the strangest places – stop peaking over the fence – get out there and comment on blog post and unlock even the key to YOUR success

You Didn’t Get Your Mail

Just wanted to write a short blog post – stop laughing – I can write a short one.  Anyway just wanted to let you know about the changes that have and going to be taken place on Zaney Clicks and ……….

 Over the last week, we have been testing email delivery or should I say the lack of.  We thank all of you for your support tickets, skype messages letting us know that you didn’t get your mail and believe me it was just as frustrating for us as it was for you.

We would chase around in the back office trying to figure out what happened to it, why didn’t it get delivered, did it go to spam and they miss it, is it floating out in cyber space somewhere or was it fighting with the cron jobs and the list of reasons go on and on.

frustrated2Well guess what, you are NOT going to have to say that You Didn’t Get Your Mail anymore because all you have to do is sign into any of the above sites and click the button that says Daily Mail – how cool is that

No more skimming thru 100’s of emails looking for today’s codes, no more waiting for delivery to be disappointed that it didn’t show and no more getting multiple emails in the same nite because someone like me put in the wrong code – you just have to login to the site and click Daily Mail.

With that being said, I would like to thank all the members of the above sites that suggested that we do this as this week has just been running lot better on all the sites yeahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh to all of you – you have another winner – WTG – keep those suggestions flowing – we love you for it.

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Rotators – how to use them and why

Well, so many folks have asked me to explain rotators – how to use them and why – so thought I would come here and give you an easy to follow explanation. I’m sure there are those who have wondered also and just not asked yet!  I know rotators mystified me when I first started with Traffic Exchanges!

First of all, a rotator combines multiple sites urls into one “rotating url”, hence the name “Rotator”. Each time your rotator is viewed on a Traffic Exchange, or in a Mailer e-mail message, a different url that you have placed inside your rotator will be viewed. This is an amazing marketing tool as not only can you add multiple sites URLs inside the rotator, but using a rotator will save you time, credits, and makes it so much easier to track your results! In Zaney Clicks, we offer this terrific service for FREE! To get started, you just need to login and scroll down to the Menu button that says “Rotators”.

Adding a Rotator at Zaney ClickAdding a Rotator at Zaney Clicks: This is the page that you will see when you click on the button “Rotators”.

The first thing that you will want to do is click on “tracker” – now a tracker is simply a way to give you information (statistics) about where your URL is being seen, how many hits you are receiving daily and this info will help you to gradually see what is working and what is not – this is very important for you to know!

Here is an example of the rotator that I made to help me get referrals.  I especially like these two in this rotator and want to give a shout out for offering this on their sites.
Your Business “Success” Story! and what I call my “Money Page

Not that hard huh? Then, I would pick 5 – 7 URL’s and add them as your tracker urls then I will explain what you do next. After you have added your trackers – then you click on rotator at the top and that lets you set up your rotator.

The next step is to give your rotator a name– you can be as creative as you want as the name that you pick will be part of your rotator’s URL  Me, I don’t get that fancy as you can see from my final URL which I just named Referral Rotator and the my other one is Nancy Recommends

Now to view this rotator you can click on the link and then click your computer’s F5 button and you should be able to see how the pages change in the rotator. Because this was not my normal amount of urls for use in a rotator, I went back and added more trackers in this example.

NOW for the BIG reason for this blog post – Rotators – how to use them and why. Once you have plastered this ONE rotator URL all over and assigned credits to it – you have just saved yourself time and here is how.

One – you only have one link that will need credits so you don’t have to surf as much to keep one URL going but, you are keeping 5 – 7 sites in front of people, at all times! If you are a person that has an abundance of credits, then I would go back and create another rotator and add either the same sites or, you can add more trackers – and then add a second or third. I know what you are thinking – why should I make a new rotator and not just add this first URL 2 or 3 times – well some sites do not let you add the same URL more than once.

Another BIG reason this will save you time is that you don’t have to remember where you added a site, you don’t have to chase all over when a site “disappears” on you or changes their url, you don’t have to chase all over when your favorite site comes out with a new splash, new promo, etc. – you just go back to Zaney Clicks and add another tracker with your NEWEST url that you want to add. Click on Rotators and add/edit sites and click to add the newest url and unclick the one that you don’t want to use anymore.

This will also take the guess work out of trying to remember, “Now, where do I have to surf for credits?”, or “Which sites am I currently using to promote – drive traffic to – my sites?” as you can come back to your Rotators Page on Zaney Clicks where you will now be able to check your tracker statistics. On the page that lists your trackers, you will see where it says “daily stats” – click that and it will tell you the site where your url is being seen and how many hits (page views) your URL received for the day.

Now, if you want to see where you have your Rotator URL – then click on “rotators” – “daily stats” and that will show you all the places that your rotator was seen today. If your list looks like it should be bigger, then I go to the left of that screen and click the arrow buttons and go back to an earlier date and you will be able to tell which Traffic Exchange you need to surf next where your Rotator is most likely to be out of credits.

How can you tell how many hits (views) per day you are receiving – well on the left side, if you click on the graph of each day (that little dot on the graph) the date will pop up along with the number of hits for that day.

I hope all this will help give you a start if you have not been using rotators because you were unsure of how to use them and I hope you will give them a try! I think you will Love using them as much as I do! Remember, if you have any questions, comments, or need help – I’m here for you – just send in a support ticket

You know it wouldn’t be me if I didn’t give some type of incentive to everyone that takes action – so what I will do – for everyone that sends me their Zaney Clicks rotator url– I will add it as login spotlight and with a start of 100 credits – now get me those Zaney Clicks Rotator URLs!!!

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Help Me I can’t decide

thinkingThere are so many times that I hear from members that there are just so many pages at a site that it makes them hard to pick the one to use to promote and I hear Help Me I can’t decide.

While I can tell you which ones get the best results for me as I track – I have also found that what works for one does not work for others.  So I have a simple solution for you  and it really does not take that long to set up and this WILL save you time and credits in the long run.

In sites where there are so many wonderful pages to choose from and even I have hard time deciding which ones to pick – well here is what I do…………….I go to Zaney Clicks and then I pick out 5 of the ones that I want to use and I set them up as trackers – now if you want to save time down the road – you can add them all in there and then go and set up a rotator.

161777811584436570_IxPBd3u7_bFor this example, I will use Zaney Clicks as there are soooooooo many to promote – I simply set up zcsplash1, zcsplash2.  Believe me I started out that way and now I get a little more descriptive in my names zccatsrule, zcspring, zcwaitingcats – well you get the idea.

After you add your trackers, then you go and set up your Zaney Rotator and then you add five of them in that rotator – then take that rotator URL and put it all over.  That’s right this is a great way to save credits – as the 5 trackers that you have added will rotate each time your rotator is shown – pretty cool huh

Now here is the best part, test these and if you are not getting referrals, then go in and pick a couple more to change out.  This is where you learn to work smarter and not harder – because you have your rotator URL all over – you just go back to Zaney Clicks and take out a few and then add a few more and test them.

You know how much time you just saved yourself because you didn’t have to chase all over and change the URL – you make your changes and they are changing where ever you had that rotator URL

cat14That is how you save time and credits – because now instead of trying to assign credits to 5 of your favorite URL’s you only have to assign them to ONE URL .  Now I know you are thinking wow I could do that with 5 favorite sites, my 5 money makers, or my 5 sites that get me referrals – easy peasy huh???????

I don’t know about you but do you ever get to the point that you get CRS and you can’t remember where you even have your links – well I admit that I suffer from that occasionally – well until I started using the free tracker and rotator services that many sites offer – when you look at your stats – you will see exactly where everything is showing and how many times.

So the next time that you just can decide and want to say Help Me I can’t decide – try this and as always would love to hear how this works for you – I know it’s been a true blessing for me now that I have gone back to work.

shhhhhkittyTIP:  Some sites have a splash page rotator and that is even a gold mine – put that in YOUR rotator and that site is covered – then just find 4 more that offer that shhhhhhhh don’t tell anyone that I let that slip out

Why I Filter My Emails

Well so many times I’m asked why I filter my emails and you know me by now that if I am asked a question often enough that I will get a post done up for you.

Teaching catThe main reason that I filter mine is that when you belong to 500 plus sites you get lot of emails and I learned early on that it’s not fun opening your email to find out that you have thousands of them to go thru AND if you were like me – you missed out on the ones that you should be seeing.

So my solution to this was to start filtering my emails and yes I do it by site – I create a folder for the site and automatically send all the emails from that site to that folder – it’s like cleaning up your file cabinet.

This is no different – you are creating files for the info that you want to store in your file cabinet and the more automated you make it the more time you are going to save.

Now once you have your folders all set up – then it makes it easy for you especially on the mailers and safelist that you might belong to.  If you are like me and on a budget, then you can’t be upgraded on all the sites and have to click for your credits.

WHY would you want to click – well the reason that I do is that I watch the opening lines of the emails and add ones that I like to my swipe file to use later.  Also, by clicking , I can see what others are promoting, which sites are popular, watch the bodies of the emails for new ideas to use on mine and of course the credits.

The great thing about clicking when they are in all ONE folder for one site – you just keep clicking till you have enough credits to send out your solo or email and then you can select all and delete the rest of the emails.   Then when you need to send again from this site, you will have the newest emails in your folder.

get organanizedAND if you are like me, you just don’t have time to click them all – so keep this in mind when you are doing your emails or solos – the person clicking time is limited and is wanting to get to that link to get their credit – so short and sweet and to the point in the body of your email.

Being we are starting the new year, this would be a great time to get your email more  organized and for me make better use of my time.

 

Work Smarter, Not Harder (part 2)

161777811584436570_IxPBd3u7_bWell I’m going to take a few minutes to put an answer to a question that I have gotten over and over the last week on the previous post Work Smarter, Not Harder and I love the feedback that I get from these post – so feel free to leave comments here or send me a support ticket

People have mentioned to me that they has been trying this theory and so I asked each one to tell me what they had been doing with the site they were promoting.  Each said they had put in the site url, added a banner and text link in other TE’s and assigned credits to that one url, banner and text – that the sites would only allow the url to be added once.

cat14After hearing this, I realized that I didn’t mention that the way to utilize ALL of your sources that is available to you did not fully explain what I was thinking and that you all are not mind readers – sorry my fault for not explaining further.

Here is what I do when a site will not allow the same url to be repeated – I will go to the site and grab the urls of the splash pages as they are all different urls – and if you go to the site that you are promoting you will hopefully see that the site has offered you a variety of pages to promote.  Oh I know you are thinking why would I want to do this.

There are a few reasons why this important to do – when you are picking out a splash page to promote you are picking the one that you like and I learned from years ago that just because I like it – others may not have the same taste as I do.

See I owned a gift shop for years and when I would go to buying shows I would take a couple girlfriends along to go with me and then I would order a variety of things from what I liked and what they liked.  This is a big mistake I made for years with the gift shop till I learned that just because I would never like this particular thing – it doesn’t mean someone else might.

Well the same works in promoting your ONE site – when you are picking the splash pages that you like based on the graphic, colors, etc. – you are limiting your audience.  So that is why it’s important to pick a splash that you don’t like, colors that you think are just ucky as there are some out there – it could be their favorite and they click.

cutekittenNow I know you are thinking, Nancy you have really gone Zaney – there is no way that someone is going to click on an add just because they like the colors, the graphics etc. well I did a test oh about a year ago and tested it – same ad and just changed the background in it – now here is the interesting part – I got the same results from each page.

So with so many talking to me this week with similar stories thought I would do a follow up post on Work Smarter, Not Harder as there might be more of you out there with the same issues.  Grab those splash page url and add them to your tracker and bet you will be surprised what your results will be.

Work Smarter Not Harder

smartcat3It’s interesting how ideas of post can pop in your head as I stopped by the chats today in TE land to wish everyone a Happy Easter.  As I lurked and watched what was being said all I could think if only these people would work smarter not harder.

Now I know lot of you are not going to be happy with me and hopefully you will listen and really think about what I’m going to tell you.  You have been around internet marketing long enough to know the money is in “the list”.  Have you been creating your list or have you just been out there following the crowd.

You have heard many people tell you to pick one program and promote, promote, promote build up your downline and then when those referrals are earning you the credits and money that you need to that site – then find another and repeat.

Why would I want to build my downline in ONE program- there are  reasons – and I will highlight a few of them here.  The first is that most programs that you are an affiliate of will pay you for bringing in referrals.  Now think about it how long do you spend a day surfing to earn .25, .50 or even 1.00?  A way to work smarter, not harder – 1 referral for .25, 2 referrals for .50 and 4 for 1.00 @ .25 each.

Now if you took that time and promoted ONE program all over – putting all your advertising sources to work for you and yes I mean ALL.  Most of your have credits built up from all the surfing that you have been doing earning those pennies, nickels, etc. right?  Well use them credits up and start promoting, promoting, promoting your ONE site and I know all of you have a favorite site, maybe one you have been paid at already, one that you surf all the time etc.

Now here is the secret that most don’t know – most sites give you a % of credits for your referrals to the point that when you get lot of referrals – you don’t even have to surf the site anymore to keep credits – now that is how to work smarter, not harder.  Most of the time new referrals need to surf to build up a credit surplus and if you look at the membership levels at your favorite site bet you will find even as a free members you get a % of credits

smarter2Got you thinking now huh?  So if one of your referrals surfed 100 pages and you get 10% – that would be 10 credits earned x 10 referrals – well you can do the math.  See how easy it can be to work smarter not harder – which is better a few hours promoting vs many hours surfing or clicking email for the same .25, .50. or $1.00 even.

So grab your favorite site’s URL and work smarter not harder and would love to hear some feed back on how much time you save in the long run and how much more money you will earn.  Thanks for listening

Banners Do Not Work

How many times have you heard that before as I know I hear it all the time.  In preparation for the upcoming event of Zaney Clicks celebrating their 5000 member celebration – I was in cleaning up the banners that were not showing and thought I would write this post.

Banners do not work if you don’t have banner impressions assigned to the banner and it was amazing how many I seen with 0 in the impressions assigned column as I was cleaning up the ones that were not showing.  This is one of the easiest and overlooked things that a member can do as you really get more bang for your credit here.

See for that ONE credit you are using to get your site seen – that ONE credit (depending on the site) can either give your banner show anywhere from 10, 20, 20 and I have even seen 45 on some sites.

So here is my zaney thinking – your banner gets view say 20 times – name in their face and then your site comes up – and they just might be more apt to click on your site – why? well because you kept it in their mind, it’s something they have seen before and that might just be the time that they say – well I need to check this out now.

Banners do not work because another thing that I noticed when checking these banners is that your image is not showing and yet you have impressions assigned to them.  There could be a number of reason but I will keep it to just a few so I don’t write a book here.

The first is that you added the urls wrong and believe it or not I have done this – am in a hurry and reverse the urls and put the image where the target one should go and then it don’t show.

Image URL:  http://zaneyclicks.com/images/banner1.jpg
Target URL:  http://zaneyclicks.com/?rid=57987

OK you know you put it in right and all of a sudden it’s not showing – well there are a couple of things that could have happen – one that site is down as they are having server problems at the time.  Heaven forbid but the site could have just vanished and is no longer around and that does happen – so periodically check your banners to see if they are showing right.

Banners Do Not Work and here is another one that I learned the hard way and it was nothing that I did wrong but the site owner made new banners and instead of reusing the banner name it was given – deleted it and add it as a new one – so even tho you did nothing wrong in putting it in – the site owner might have made some changes and I see this alot with sites that like to do seasonal banners.

Standard Banner 468×60

The one last thing that I will mention – there is a right size and a wrong size when inserting your image urls.  So many times I see people trying to put a 468×60 image in a 125×125 area and all that happens there is that your image is so crunched up that it’s not readable. I know there are many names that some of the banners are call but the standard banners are most 468×60 and then there are the square banners, button banners well those are the 125×125.

Square Banner or Button Banner

http://zaneyclicks.com/images/banner1.jpg  as you will see from this URL the .jpg or some will have .gif or .png – this is what you want as your image url.  On the LFMTE scripts now you will also see http://zaneyclicks.com/getimg.php?id=2 and that is telling the site to go get the #2 image at Zaney Clicks

So hope this has cleared up some of the questions or problems that you have run across and when you hear one of your referrals say Banners Do Not Work – now you know what to tell them as to some of the reasons why.

Stopping the Insanity

insanityWell I have held off on this post for long time now and have been chatting with members and other site owners and I’m going to take a big STEP here and stopping the insanity.

Earlier I had put in an email that there were some changes coming down the road for Zaney Clicks – well I have spent days behind the scene looking at stats, I have went back thru all the members emails that I have got with suggestions, new ideas, and I’m listening.

I know it don’t seem like it sometimes but I do – and I thank all the members for being honest with me – and I was going to wait till the first of the year but when I looked back at the calendar of events, the stats etc.  I have decided that the time for stopping the insanity is NOW.

AND what better time to write this post – Halloween – so for some of you this will be a treat and some of you will think it’s a trick.  Beginning November 1st – ALL regular monthly promos will be canceled.  Shocked you didn’t I?????????????

Well before you get all hiper – let me tell you what I have been hearing from members and they are right – we spend all this time setting up daily promos when that time could be spent working harder for YOU helping you get the traffic that you need, getting the referrals that you are looking for and earning the money that you are wanting to.  So in the future that is what I am going to be doing with the new things that just started at Zaney Clicks – they are going to be a bigger benefit for you as a member and help you the way the site should be helping you..

A few of the new changes have been started with some pages in rotation that has a code and only upgraded members can see and claim – they have a week to make the claim and each get a prize for claiming the codes.  After claiming the code all those members are put in a drawing for a referral and the other a week start page.

KeithHolyCowWHY in the world would I do this – well the reason is that these members have invested in this site by upgrading and I feel that they should also be able to have a chance to build their list.  So this site is going to help them do that by giving away more ACTIVE random referrals, login spotlight pages, start pages, etc.  There will be codes, bonus pages, hangman and other ways that free members can keep earning but I’m also going to take the pressure off you with trying to surf the most.

See I know from experience that these forms of advertising work – when a person can build their list they start making more money, when they can show their pages to everyone for a week they are more likely to get more referrals and also earn more money.

NOW the bottom line here as I know some people are thinking what about the cash that I am earning as of right now this site has paid out some great commissions and will continue to do so.  You will just have new and different ways to earn those commissions and the one that I will be keeping is when I catch you promoting as I surf.

So just wanted to say to all the members that have been in touch with me since July 2012 when the daily promos started – thank you, thank you and thank you for finally getting it thru my head that you DO NOT want to join anymore sites just to win some prizes.  I heard you when you said that you want to surf the sites that you like and stick with them.  You have also said that you are tired of the pressure of so many promos, you are tired of them and want something different.  Well you are going to get something different.

Will this all happen overnight – the answer is NO but I also felt that is was just time to stop talking about it and go cold turkey.  So as of November 1st the only promos that will stay on the calendar Money Monday and Take A Break Tuesday.   I will be getting all the promo prizes caught up and then starting the “NEW” events that have been planned for Zaney Clicks..

Another change that I have listened to is the upgrade that I give away to the person that surfs the most for the week – and thanks members for telling me that I’m wasting your credits for allowing that one – so that one has been changed and it will go to the person that has the most sales.

So we will still have 3 upgrades given out each week and they will go to the person that finds the Treasured Site, The Most Referrals and Person with Highest Sales.  We will still draw a winner from the list of people that submit the site to the Text Link in the email.

changesSo wanted to get this out tonight so that when you see the calendar clean in November you will know why.  All site owners that are reading this I will be personally chatting with you on this matter.  I would like to personally thank everyone that has hung in there and put up with so many promos, and thank to all the members that have come to me with your suggestions, new ideas etc. – this is going to be fun to get these started.