Cheap and Easy Way to Sell Ebooks
I am in the planning stages of my first ebook. As I put together my plans, I’ve been trying to figure out out how to handle the sales of the book when I am finished. I had looked into Clickbank, but you have to pay to get listed and then it still doesn’t easily handle the sales. I didn’t want to go to the hassles of making my own secure downloads and then putting up a shopping cart. Luckily I discovered E-junkie
Basically, they handle the downloads for the product and they provide a simple shopping cart. This means that you can stick some simple code on your site and people can easily buy the ebook and download it, without any work on your part. They even have affiliate programs built in so that it’s easy to get people selling for you. A big bonus is that their basic fee is just $5 /month. That’s a good deal that is difficult to pass up.
I will certainly be using them when I start selling my ebooks. They make it easy to get started selling digital content.
Making A Custom Facebook URL For The Rest Us
I never intended this to be a two part post, but I notice that many people have benefited from my previous post on Making A Custom Facebook Profile Address. Unfortunately, it was a method really only suited for those with their own hosting and willing to hack their .htaccess. While it’s pretty simple to do, I realized that not everyone could do it. The good news is that I figured out another way to get a custom Facebook URL that is easy enough for anyone to do.
URL Shortening Services To The Rescue
An easy way to get a more customized Facebook URL is by using URL shortening services like tinyurl.com. Normally, they work by creating a link like http://tinyurl.com/cur6q6 but they can just as easily create a link like http://tinyurl.com/jackwoodsfacebook.
Nitty Gritty Details
How do you do it? Just visit tinyurl.com. On their page, put in the link to your Facebook profile address. If you have any problem finding it, check out the part 1 post and the directions are there. Mine is http://www.facebook.com/people/Jack-Woods/1022785814. There is a little box below that says “Custom alias (optional):.” That’s where you will put in your custom name. In my case, I tried first jackfacebook and that was already taken so I tried jackwoodsfacebook and it gave me the link http://tinyurl.com/jackwoodsfacebook. Easy, right?
Other URL Shortening Services
You are also not limited to just tinyurl.com. Many of the URL shortening services let you shorten the URL to a custom name or alias. Bit.ly allowed me to shorten my long Facebook url to http://bit.ly/jackwoods.
Pretty cool, huh? Granted it’s better to use a redirect from your own domain, but these URL shortening services do really help you get a better, more customized Facebook address and are an acceptable substitute.
Greatest Treasure: The Marianas Trench
I love Saipan and I like having the opportunity to share the places around here. I truly believe that eco friendly tourism is the way for the local economy to grow and prosper. One of the treasures that Saipan has is the Marianas Trench.
Here is an NBC report that I found embedded on the Saipan Blog. It’s certainly worth a watch for anyone wanting to know about one of the greatest maritime treasures that the world has.
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
6 Questions To Ask Your Web Developer
I am starting to do web design and development for clients and part of this involves coming up with proposals. My goal isn’t to take business from other web designers, but rather it is to grow the market by making it higher quality. In communicating with clients, I have come up with several questions that they should ask any web designer or developer before hiring them.
Q1) Who maintains ownership of the domain?
Q2) Do you have any expertise in web marketing?
Q3) Are your designs standards compliant?
Q4) Do you ensure that all content is free from errors and search engine optimized?
Q5) What is your web development philosophy?
Q6) What websites have you designed?
I know these questions seem pretty corny, but believe it or not, many non tech savvy people do need to get web design and development work done and haven’t got a clue as to the answers. Answering these questions can easy become a sales pitch if written correctly.
I’d love to add to this list so if you have some great questions to add to this list, please leave them in the comments.
Post Office Generator Spews Smoke
Those who know me know that I am not an environmentalist. I detest those whackos who try to shove everything down your throat as an environmental problem. I don’t believe that humans are causing global warming and I believe that environmental quality is improving across the world. I believe that environmental friendliness is a direct result of economic advancement. All of that said, I saw something last night that made me cringe.
We had a two hour power outage last night. I find out after the fact that it was a schedule outage for our area of the island. The CUC(Commonwealth Utilities Commission) needed to replace a brushing or something like that. After the power went off, I woke up. No fans or air con in the tropics can do that to you. It wasn’t bad sitting out on the front porch so I pulled out a chair and sat out there for two hours.
It was lighted thanks to the Post Office lights. See, the USPS Post Office has a generator that kicks in automatically when power goes out. It keeps the lights and air conditioning on and functioning. Yes, the diesel generator kicked in from 1:30 AM until 3:30 AM to ensure that the post office was lighted and air conditioned.
In case you were wondering, no one was at the post office at that hour and the post office generator was belching out smoke. I see no point in having it running at that time. I think it’s a waste of money and a waste of the environment. I understand they may need the lights at night, but a solar power solution would be cheap and effective over the long run.
And there would be no smelling diesel exhaust.
Get A Free Domain
If you have always wanted a free domain, now is the time to get one for free at chi.mp. .mp is the domain extension for the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and a company has worked with the domain registry to offer free domains that work with the chi.mp interface.
Basically, as long as you are willing to use the chi.mp blogging software, you can have your very own domain name. You can even set up an email forward with it. You should really check it out to see just how it can work with your online strategies.
What happens if you start using the domain and don’t like the interface or want to go your own direction? No problem, you can register the domain for $20 a year. While it is pricey, it’s actually affordable if you get just the domain name you want.
Thoughts After One Month
As I start my second month here on Saipan, I am continuing to be amazed by this place. It’s nice being on an idyllic, tropical American island. It’s been a great time so far. Every day we can go out to the beach and take a swim in the ocean. It’s not too hot around here and even in the middle of the day, a fan keeps you cool inside and if you are outside, the nice trade wind breezes keep you comfortable.
I am glad we made the move to Saipan. Even though the economy here is tough, I do see a lot of opportunities here to make more money. I am currently exploring an opportunity to make and design websites for local Saipan businesses. If this pans out, our stay here could be quite long indeed.
Anyways, going forward, life is good and it’s getting better. I do feel like I am now in the land of opportunity.
One quick note: We are TVless. That means no TV. Long story, but we are trying to do without a TV and see how it works for us as a family. Maybe in another month I can update you….all I know right now is that a new home projector sure is looking good.
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