My Affiliate Program is Back

A few months ago I did away with my affiliate program for my products.

Why?

Because too many people were signing up and only using their affiliate link to buy products for themselves.

This is annoying because not only are they looking to get something half price (my affiliate program pays 50% commission) but also because they weren't promoting my products to others, which is the whole point of the program.

I always offer my new products at really low prices to subscribers. I do it all the time, so there's no need for anyone to try and get a 50% discount because my reduced prices for subscribers are way better than that.

So I stopped allowing affiliates to sell my products.

The problem though, was that more people wanted to sign up, but couldn't.

I gave it much thought and in the end I decided to start my affiliate program again but this time with a difference - affiliates won't get paid for purchases through their own affiliate links.

There are plenty of other affiliate programs that don't allow this practice. Even the mighty ClickBank, with well over 150,000 affiliates doesn't allow them to make purchases through their own affiliate links.

And now I don't either.

I've updated the new affiliate information at http://cheritonhousepublishing.com/affiliates.html and added the new info about not paying out for affiliates own purchases.

So there it is.

If you were already signed up as one of my affiliates, your links will still work. I haven't changed anything, I've simply re-instated it again.

And it's worth joining because affiliate marketing is a great way to earn money from writing. It's something I do all the time.

I regularly promote other people's products as an affiliate. Not all products that I recommend are through affiliate links. But many are.

And I NEVER promote products that I don't believe are great because I don't want to upset anyone and make them not trust me.

So if you've ever wanted to make more money from your writing but you've never tried affiliate marketing, you could be leaving a lot of money on the proverbial table.

Just recently I began promoting a product (in another niche) that paid out $66 per sale. I wrote 3 short articles to promote it and made 2 sales in the first week! How great is that?

I'm often asked what's the secret of making money through affiliate marketing, and I honestly don't know. But I do know that it works as long as you're not too "salesy."

When I made the quick sales on the $66 product, the articles were only loosely based around subject of the product. They were information articles that I uploaded to EzineArticles.com one at a time. It was that easy.

But I'm not saying it's always that easy, but sometimes it is.

And when it is, it's great.

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New Great Offers for Writers to Help You Finally Get Your Projects Started AND Finished

Today I have several new offers for you from Writers' Store and Writers' Digest.

Their products are already helping thousands of writers all over the world and really are great to own and to use.

If you've been promising yourself that there's a novel you're going to write or a screenplay your going to finish or any other writing project that you just can't seem to get around to completing, then download (or buy and have shipped) any of these (or other) writing resources and FINALLY get things started and finished.


Save $20 on Character Writer 3.1 software at the Writers Store
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On sale 5th April to the 20th 2015

Free Shipping on the new book A Writer's Guide to Persistence at Writer's Digest Shop!
Persistence is often the key ingredient between authors who successfully publish and those who don’t. A Writer’s Guide to Persistence teaches authors how to sustain their writing habit, weather rejection, avoid discouragement and embrace the writing journey. The writing and publishing world is rapidly changing, causing many writers to be distracted from their true writing purpose. This book is chocked full of writing resources including advice and experiences from bestselling authors.
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Writing a Novel for Screenwriters Premium Collection (Mac Version) for Just $99 at Writers Store

I Feel Like I'm Working For Google

For the past few days (well, a week really) I've been busy working away making all my websites "mobile responsive."

This means that they have to be flexible, and morph into shape to fit any screen size from mobile phone to desktop computer.

I have several websites so it's taking me quite some time to do it. So far I've already completed half of my sites (phew! She wipes the virtual sweat from her brow) but it's taking a lot of work and a lot of working out.

The reason I'm doing it is because Google says I have to.

On 21st April 2015 they are bringing in new rules about search results and say that they won't include  non-mobile-responsive websites in their mobile results.

The reason I want keep my rankings in the Google search results, is that for several keywords I'm on page one of search results and for one, at least, I'm number one. (Yay! Go me!)

So this past week of working flat out, and with the pressure from Google, who keep emailing me about my website problems, I feel like I'm working for them. And they are bad payers because I'm not earning more money for all my extra effort and I'm not getting my own work done either.

On the other hand, making my websites mobile responsive is something that I've been thinking about for a while now. Thinking, but not doing anything about it.

But now the pressure is on. I have to get things finished in less than 2 weeks - or else.

And it's not just mobile responsiveness that Google is looking at. They are also concerned about sites with too many broken links amongst other things.

You can read more about Google's new rules at http://www.webpronews.com/things-to-avoid-for-googles-mobile-friendly-update-2015-03.

And if you have websites, or just one website, and you want people with mobile phones to be able to find your site using the search engines, then you'd better make sure it's fluid and that all your pages are completely up-to-date with no issues.

If you have a WordPress site, you need to make sure that you're using a theme that is mobile responsive.

If you're like me and you use HTML static web design, then you need to redesign your site to make it change layout for different media (screen size).

I use Adobe DreamWeaver for all my website designing, except for this blog because it's owned by Google and so they keep the design up to date for me so that they don't break their own rules.

DreamWeaver has built-in "fluid grid" web page software which basically means that when I build a webpage for mobile viewing, the design automatically filters though to the other 2 screen sizes - desktop and tablet. So all I have to do is a bit of tweaking here and there to get my web pages exactly how I want them on all 3 screen sizes, and it can all be done without coding.

But in the meantime, I'm missing being a writer because although web page designing is something I can do (although this type of designing has been quite a bit of a learning curve), it's not my favourite job. That's why I count myself fortunate to be able to use Adobe DreamWeaver software to make the task quicker and easier.

And speaking of which, it's time for me to get back to work and make my web page designs really sing.

Good luck with your own websites.

:)

Google Demands Responsive Websites or Sites Won't be Indexed

Google is currently pushing all website owners to make their websites responsive (or fluid) so that they can be viewed on all Smart Phones.

What Google considers a Smart Phone is any phone running on Android, iPhone, or Windows Phone operating systems with web browsers that work similar to desktop computer browsers and are able to display webpages that conform to HTML5 specifications. In other words, most modern phones.

They will also penalise websites that have what Google considers to be "common mistakes" which includes slow-loading mobile pages and making Flash video the majority of a page’s content.


But they do provide a page where you can test your website to see if it comes up to their new standards at.

https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/

The biggest push of all is that the deadline for getting websites up-to-date and Smart Phone responsive, is 21st April 2015.

So that's less than 3 weeks from now.

And what is it that they plan to do to hurt websites owners without responsive websites?

They won't include your website in their mobile search results.

My problem with all this, is that only one of my websites is responsive. And that's this one.

So now my challenge is to redesign all my websites (and I have several) by 21st April.

Google keeps emailing me and listing all the problems with my current websites (thanks Google).

And I don't want to lose my spots in the search results because for many keywords and key phrases, I'm on the first page of Google results, and for one I'm actually at the number one spot.

Which means, that to stay afloat in the crazy ever-changing online world, I have to knuckle down and work hard to bring my websites kicking and screaming into responsive design.

Sadly, the only way to do this is to let all my other work slide for the time being while I crack on with this.

Hopefully, I'll have it done in one week (ha, ha, ha...I'm so damn funny sometimes) so if you don't get any emails from me or blog updates in the near future, that's why.

Damn you Google!!!!

But I guess it was only a matter of time until this all caught up with me because I really should have taken care of this problem months/years ago. I've been thinking about it for a while now. But that's all I've been doing. Thinking.

And as they say, a goal without action is simply a dream.

So now here I go with my first of many website redesigns.

See you on the flip side.

You can read more about this Google Push at

http://insideout.com/blog/2015/03/24/google-mobile-friendly-algorithm-is-your-website-ready/

And if you have any websites that aren't mobile responsive, now would be a good time to change that.