Shopping wars are under way

I do believe that the advertising war on the internet has heated up to a furnace level. I say that because I have been swamped with offers to write advertising articles. Some are easy such as a home remedy for acne, in fact I did an article about that same subject a few years back for Associated Content and I still get paid on page views from it. In fact I normally get at least $3 a month in PV's on that one article.

Since I have been swamped with offers to write, I have had to turn many of them down. I will not even look at them if the offer is under $12. That helps to weed many of them out. If they want more than 250 words the price goes up even further. It takes time to write those articles and my time just went up in price.

If companies are will to shell out the money for advertising then they can afford to lower their prices on many of the items I see on "sale." Those sale prices are still too high for my tastes.

Poll shows only 7% of people shopping on Black Friday

A local TV station in Portland, Oregon conducted a short poll on what people were doing on Black Friday. The results were announced today on the evening TV news. I thought the answers were pretty much what I thought they would be.

Here is the choices people were given and the percentage of the results:
Question: What will you be doing on Black Friday?

• shopping - 7%
• sleeping in and digesting all that food eaten on Thanksgiving - 24%
• Spending time with family or friends - 25%
• Going back to work - 43%
• Unsure - 1%

So it looks like most people have to work the day after Thanksgiving. I ended up running errands all over town to places that are normally closed on Saturdays, the day when I normally get a chance to run errands.

Now according to the results of that poll, it looks like not many people are spending those hard earned dollars yet. What I did find out from their news broadcast was that most people are using cash and not credit to buy things this Christmas.

I've got writers block or is it?

The dreaded bane of all professional writers has hit me, writers block. I don't think that it is real writers block as much as procrastination. I have about 7 more articles to write for Yahoo and although I have rough drafts written for them I have been putting off finishing them.

Procrastination will be the great undoing of many people. I know the feeling all too well. I do manage to complete all what I need to do before it is due and that includes paying bills, filing documents and buying ink for my printer before it runs out but damn, it bugs me that I tend to put things off until almost the last minute.

I have known 2 people that started businesses only to fail because they were terrible procrastinators. One guy tried to run a printing business and just could not keep up with the customers deadlines. Thankfully he did not invest in any large printers but leased them instead. Instead of going out of business entirely he sold the business to his son who made it a success.

Tip for the day:   If you are a procrastinator either don't have a business with deadlines or have someone help you keep on track with demands.

Getting up at 2am to shop? No way!

Why in the world would people want to shop on Black Friday at 3am in the morning? I have heard that many stores are planning midnight openings or just slightly later. If a store opened at 3am in the morning that means you have to be up at 2am just to get ready to go to the store. What on earth would be worth getting up that early for? The stores would have to have some pretty low priced items to get me out of bed that early. There are only 2 things that would get me up that early and they would be a notebook computer priced under $150 or an iPod touch for $100 or less. Everything else will eventually go down in price about 1 week before Christmas.

I feel really sorry for the people who work retail during this time of year. Most of them are part time and they don't get paid extra money to show up for those early openings......it is just expected of them.

I can't believe that Christmas is just over a month away

Can you believe it is almost the end of the year? The holiday shopping season is well under way. I was just in the Dollar store picking up plastic storage bags and I could not help to notice people doing their Christmas shopping in there. There were 4 cashiers working full tilt and all of them had long lines. Again.....this was at the DOLLAR STORE!!! I did notice that kids toys and stocking stuffers seem to be the items that were getting the most interest but it was the gift wrap that was selling.

I wonder if this Christmas will bring out more spending than the last one. We shall see.

I have too much work

How would you like to have so much work that you have to turn it down? I never thought it would happen to me, but it has. Currently I have over 14 articles to write for Yahoo and 20 paid blog posts. Thankfully most of the work is due next week otherwise I would be tearing my hair out. Yes I will get them done but I will not be encouraging Yahoo to send me anymore work, at least for a few weeks. Each of those articles will be paying $15 for 400 words. At least I don't have to use any keywords that they supply. I certainly don't seek out any unusual articles about subjects I know nothing about such as phentermine or car mechanics. I stick to what I am comfortable writing about. I have actually turned a few articles back in to Yahoo because I simply could not figure out an article that would do the subject matter any clear justice.

It is a problem that brings in some nice extra cash each month. A problem that I am glad to have.

If you have a website or blog this is the best time of year

This is the best time of year to make money online. If you have a blog or website then people and companies are lining up to buy advertising or persuade you to join their affiliate program so you can make a commission on each sale made through your site. You can make money promoting practically anything. I personally make commissions from sales on eBay. They are not MY items but other people's items, I simply send customers to those items knowing that they will buy them. The items can be anything from jewelry to the best weight loss pills but I get a commission on each click as long as that click translates into a purchase on eBay.

I have made as much as $50 in one day just sending people to items on eBay. Most do not buy the item I send them to, but they do end up buying something else, which translates into a commission for me.

It is now official - I work for Yahoo

Associated Content is now officially the Yahoo Contributor Network and I love the new higher pay I am getting. I use to earn peanuts for my articles (about $3 to $7 per offer) now I earn $10 and up for my articles on Yahoo. Apparently, Yahoo loves my movie articles and now they offer me $15 to write short 400 word articles about movies.

It seems that even though the paid blogging offers have dwindled dramatically over the past year (in comparison to prior years), this type of article writing has increased by leaps and bounds for me. I also like the fact that I don't really have to promote the articles as much as I had to in the past. It seems that Yahoo does a good job in promoting them for me.

Are you sick of Christmas shopping yet?

I don't know which is worse, shopping at stores that have their Christmas decorations up on the day after Halloween or seeing the first "Chia Pet" ad of the season on TV last week. Can we please get through Thanksgiving before we have to think about Christmas trees and personalcreations.com stockings. Yes websites are also popping up just to push Christmas stuff.

Just as a side note, did you know that several Halloween costume places (mostly online stores) filed for bankruptcy the day after Halloween? Most of them just shut their doors. When will these places get the big hint and realize that people do not have huge parties when the economy has not shown positive improvement.

As I mentioned in a previous blog post, people are only buying the basics this holiday season. If you have a company that sells novelties or frivolous items, then expect less than stellar sales.On the other hand basic clothes, food and household items that need to be replaced will do well. The only electronic extras might be for the kids toys or iPods. Amazon's Kindle might do well since they have lowered their price on them. But expect lower prices on everything as we get closer to Christmas.

Is the economy getting better?

What do you think? Is the economy getting better or worse? I see the holiday sales season is well under way with early Black Fridays and football gifts being pushed down customers throats. But wait.......people are shopping!!!

I was in a local hardware/feed store today (they were have their Black Friday today) and they were having a storewide 10% off of everything. The parking lot was packed and people were piling their carts full of stuff. The items were NOT gifts but items for repairing fences, pet and livestock feeds as well as some high priced tools.

People are indeed buying but the items are more along the lines of essentials than toys or fun luxuries. It is a back to basics for this holiday season.

How is the shopping season so far?

If you have visited any major store in the last week, you would have seen the Christmas decorations going up and many stores getting ready for the NEW Black Friday. Yep, there is a new Black Friday and it is not the day after Thanksgiving. It is this coming Friday, November the 12th. It seems that the stores are getting so desperate for those barcode scanners to get a workout at the checkout stands, they are pushing for an extra early start to the holiday shopping season.

Now let's face some sobering facts, unless people feel that their future income is secure (job is doing great, income coming in) they will not be shopping for frivolous gifts or extras for themselves this season.

Writing more articles for Associated Content

I am so thrilled to becoming a popular writer on Associated Content. I am now a featured contributor for 3, yes 3 sections. AC kept sending me emails asking that I join the sections (pets, technology and finance) that I finally gave in and joined.

I have been a member on there since 2006 but did not start writing for them until 2007. The advantages of becoming a featured contributor is that you write 3 articles about your chosen subject each month for $10 each. That means I will earn $90 minimum for maybe 4 hours work each month. Of course that does not include the other articles I write which I can get paid a minimum of $6 each and most of them are in the $10 to $15 range. I can easily earn $200 a week if I wrote 3 articles a day.

I have noticed that many new writers on there do not have a clue how to be successful on the site. They write articles that the subject matter can be found else where. For example, articles about "how to get rid of acne fast" will not get many views if that subject matter is covered in-depth at the Mayo Clinic website. The same for almost any subject. Your article has to not only be unique but on a subject, but also not covered in-depth all over the internet.

Another thing that the new article writers are doing is writing their articles in the style of a blog post. AC is stepping in and removing those articles - thankfully. "Open letters" and  "updates on what they have been doing" to their "fans" is not what Associated Content needs or wants on their website.

If you think that having an extra few hundred dollars a week is just what the doctor ordered, then join me at Associated Content (click on the badge in the side bar) and start writing and get paid for it.

Holiday concerts

Every year my brother-in-law treats us to a Holiday concert. It is his Christmas present to our family. The last few years it was to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. The concert tickets are not cheap as he gets us the best seats, only a few rows from the stage. Hopefully this coming holiday I will be able to afford a similar gift to give to him for being so generous to our family for the past several years.