In the last month or so I have tried out a lot of scripts and tested them out. Pligg was probably the best one I tried but at the moment it’s very buggy and the modules available are not the most user friendly. I spent a while testing the RSS module and in the end my conclusion is that it has a mind of it’s own haha. I did get it working eventually but after playing around with the script for a day or so I realised that any project I started with that script would be too time consuming with not enough return ie. my time would be better spent elsewhere.
Thankfully, in the last week I have not spent my time researching. The week kicked off with me launching this blog. A day or so later Google started handing out PageRank penalties to a lot of blogs and a few days after that Google finally did an update of it’s PageRank.
Blogging Tips got a PR 4 (it’s first rank) which is not too bad considering so many other top blogs have this PR. The rest of my sites have not been too lucky. First off, Texas Holdem Forums went from a 4 down to a 2. There is a good chance I have been punished for selling links but since that sites income doesnt really depend on selling text links I need to decide whether to keep selling text links and make a few extra bucks or stop selling them altogether. I’m gonna look into this and see what the best thing to do is.
I also have 4 or 5 other sites which have had their PR reduced. These concern me more because those sites main income was from text links. I completely agree with those who say that you should not reply on PR for income however at the time those sites were bringing in no money and using TLA allowed me to bring in some extra cash very easily. For example, Casino Room Review seems to have dropped from a 4 to a 0. Those little text links on the home page made me around $80 a month. Not a lot of money but through sites like that I make about $750 a month. It will be interesting to see if they make any money at all but to be honest I’m not that bothered, I kinda knew there would be a time where those sites would not make money so any money I have made up until now using that method has been a bonus.
The main site I have been working on this week is Texas Holdem Forums. The sites growth has slowed considerably in the last 2 years, mainly due to me travelling alot (I got back to the UK in July after 8 months of travelling). I used to set up a lot of games for the members there but the numbers in games dwindled and anytime I put money towards a game it was pretty much lost because I was not seeing a return. Of course, the US policy on gambling had an effect on the site but I don’t think that was the reason.
When a member this week complained that the site was needing a jump and that I wasn’t spending too much time on the site it gave me the kick up the ass I needed to start working more on the site. I spoke to the members about it and they were very very understanding. Infact, when I suggested that it was difficult for me to spend as much time on the site as I used to they all grouped together and came up with ideas and suggestions for the site. I have ran over a dozen forums in the last 7 years, some big, some small, and I don’t recall running a forum with such loyal members. I am going to be working much more on the forum in the next few months. I hope that it makes me more money and provides more games for the members too. I had also mentioned in the post that perhaps I should sell it as I didn’t think I had the time to run. After I wrote that I spoke to Tyler Cruz on messenger and asked what he thought I would get for the site but after speaking to him and another poker contact I knew that (a) I wouldn’t get a good price and more importantly (b) I would regret selling it, because the site can make a lot of money and more than that, it doesn’t feel like work when I’m updating it etc.
On a completely unrelated issue, I logged into Analytics the other day and saw that my stats for Blogging Tips were 0. I had changed the design of the site and had forgot to add the tracker back to the footer. Oops!!
Lastly, I wanna say congrats to Mani on the new design of his blog, Daily SEO Blog. Looks very professional bud.
What did everyone else work on in the last week?
:)