How much can a website earn?

I have stumbled upon an interesting website today.  Basically it's a web traffic/revenue analyser.  You type in any URL, and it gives you basics stats, like visitors a day, ad revenue a day etc. 

I popped in few addresses just to get a feeling for how it works and made interesting discoveries. 

Your website needs to be really, really big to make you a decent money.  Just to give you an example - a website getting 4800 visitors a day and full of ads has an earning potential of 22 dollars. A day.  Yearly it adds up to something like $8000.  Oops.

See, a website needs to be really good to attract 5000 visitors daily.  REALLY.  This blog, so far, has got something like 80 visitors altogether.  5000 a day seems far, far beyond the horizon. 

I guess I would need to write something like 20 posts daily, all about hot, hot topics, plus have twenty other income sources to survive, not even mentioning any surplus money.  How sad is that?

But hey, yeah, everybody promises you millions from the web, within weeks sometimes, stick to it, dead reader.  It's so good to dream.

The Truth

I seem to have a problem.  A true problem.  With the truth.

See, it's so bloody unpopular these days.

There's marketing, there's political correctness, there's being entertaining and putting on a show.  None of it has any resemblance to the truth.  All of it is based on manipulation.  And all of it is extremelly traffic-generating.

It looks like people simply want to be lied to, they love it.

I have to confess something.  I find it difficult to tell a direct lie.  It's not that I'm not capable of it, it's only that I'm terribly conscious of what I'm doing and terribly uncomfortable throughout the process.  Looks like a bit of a conundrum, really.  See, I've decided to steer clear of payroll employment so that I don't have to lie to people every day (yes, this meat mincer is the most exciting product you can have, it will truly transform your life, and yes, I'm having a wonderful time at this four hour long business strategy meeting, and yes, your ideas are so enlightened, my dear boss - you know the type of lies). 
So I moved to online income to escape it all but...  it looks like nothing really changed.  No bullshit = no traffic.  Ehh... 

Funny thing, I seem to be in the minority, you know?  Nobody else seems to mind.  Quite depressing, really.

How about 'Say Hello To a Nutter Day'?

Weird thing, but The Blog To Make Me Money is not making me any money yet.  I guess I will need to promise you the Apocalypse or something before it does (ok, ok, I will shut up about the Apocalypse.  Eventually...), but in the meantime - I figure that as long as you don't pay me for writing about something specific, I can write about anything I fancy.  Spewing my fantastic individuality in the process, or just enjoying myself.  Because why the fuck not. 

So, how about 'Say Hello To a Nutter Day'?  I've just discovered this blog, written by some totally insane girl with a knack for weird drawings and montypythonesque humour and I feel overwhelming gratefulness for all the nutters out there.  How they make our lives sweeter! 

Even if you are a straight, down-to-earth type, appreciate the nutters!  If they don't manage to extract a smile from your face, at least you have someone to feel superior to. 

Nah, what am I saying, everybody loves nutters. 

That's why there should be a day dedicated specifically to them.  Today, for example.  Where do I apply?  Do I need to collect some signatures?  How much does it take to get the notion to Wikipedia?

I'll have a look and let you know.

Or not. 

But tell your friends.  It's a Worthy Cause.  Nutters need some love too!

Apocalypse, cancelled

Oops, it looks like the Apocalypse didn't happen again. 

If you sold or gave away all your belongings to celebrate the big day and now find yourself in deep slurry - serves you well for being such an idiot.

I think it's an unbelievable, amazing phenomenon - take the biggest looney you can find, tell him to preach the most ridiculous bullshit you can imagine, and there still be thousands of people running, RUNNING, to give him money.  Jaw-dropping unbelievable. 

All that in the world with hunger, cancer, homelessness etc...  Don't feed a beggar, pay a thousand dollars for a billboard, to make people aware of the coming Armageddon.  The Armageddon somehow didn't materialise, and there's no sign of Christ anywhere, either, but who cares, right?  There will be more looneys like Harold Camping and they too will make fortunes out of their stories, and there will still be people waving their credit cards to support theit cause. 

What a wacky world we live in.

Would I make money too if I suddenly announced here on this blog that the angel told me of the SURE and CERTAIN date for the next Apocalypse, say November 11?  Would I become an instant celebrity with piles of cash on my account?  Would you donate you hard earned money, dear reader, to support my claim?  I wish you would, but somehow I'm convinced that you wouldn't. 

How unfair. 

And I'm prettier than Harold Camping, too.

The End of the World

Apparently, the world is going to end pretty soon.  On the 21st of May, to be precise. 

See, checking top Google keywords from time to time can really broaden your horizons.  Now I can quickly run to a bank, get a huge loan and I still have almost two weeks for splashing it out in the most pleasurable ways. 

Or maybe I should decide that some religious looneys hunting for hidden messages in the Bible are not that trustworthy after all and I might end up with a huge loan to pay. 

See, that's the trick with Armageddon.  It's been promised so many times that no one really believes it anymore. 

I have a suspicious feeling that the proper one will not be foreseen by anyone and none of us will have a chance to get this loan, unfortunately. 

In the meantime, it's really enjoyable to hunt for the most recent prophets.  I only wonder how badly will their career suffer if nothing happens...  I nearly feel sorry for them.

Oh, and did you know that Rome is scheduled to be flattened out today by a huge earthquake?  It got so much publicity that a dramatic rise in school and work leaves has been noted.  Well, the spring is in full bloom, the weather balmy and a day out in the country will do everyone good, so maybe we should have more of those predictions?

And if you want to find some really good stuff about the End, read Terry Pratchett or Douglas Adams.  Much more enjoyable than paranoid scenarioes of the Bible-groupies.

How not to lose your money

Today, for a change, instead of a rant I'm going to post a very sound piece of advice. 

It seems very simple, yet so many people tend to neglect it and pay mountains of cash which could be reduced to smallish hills with one simple action.

The word for today is...  BILLS.

You know, those nasty piece of paper that stubbornly arrive to you in post (supposedly with twice the speed of cheques) and scream - GIVE ME YOUR MONEY!!! 

My advice is this:  read your bills.  Read them carefully and if you have any doubts as to where something is coming from, contact your service provider immediately.  With one simple question - why should I pay it and why this much?

It may seem dumb, right?  But I've recently avoided paying extra 2000 euros (!!!) doing just that.
Might be happening only here in Ireland, but I'm noticing a trend that's becoming a standard practice of all the service providers.  It's the habit of adding some funky amounts to your bill in hope you won't notice, or you'll be too busy or too shy to query it. 

Well, I've heard of mobile phone companies who add only a few cents to all the bills and the cents add up to fortunes.  I can live with that, but adding hundreds???  Just hoping you won't bother to give them a ring about it?????

A real life story to illustrate my point.  I've received a renewal note of my car policy couple of weeks ago.  The way it works, if you didn't ring the company, they would assume you accept the contract and would proceed to draw the money from your account by direct debit. 
The rate on the renewal notice was more than 1500 euros.  Excuse me?  Twice the worth of my car?
I called their office and politely asked why am I supposed to pay this much.  The lady on the other side of the line put me on hold for half an hour or so (OK, I'm exaggerating, but only slightly) and when she finally returned, she said - we've recalculated your rate and you're actually supposed to pay 500 euros, we're very sorry. 

No, it's I who would be sorry if I didn't ring them and didn't refused to pay this absurd pile of cash.  They can only be sorry that the trick didn't work.

I mean - oops, we've just told you to give us a 1000 euro just because we fancied the idea, we're very sorry that you've caught on??  Goddamnit!

So please, please, please, DO read your bills.  And ring the bloody bastards.  Even if you don't manage to knock some money off your bill, you'll surely have a chance to get rid of some excess venom from your system.  Which is always something.

The language of marketing

I'm sure there's many doctors, professors and other big fish of the marketing world, who can all justify the fact that marketing uses the language that it does.  I'm sure all the rules out there are well researched, have enormous impact on sales figures etc. etc.

I'm only wondering how does it bounce off against a normal, living, flesh and blood creature.  I'm thinking - are people really THAT stupid??  Can it be???

But I'm racing to the point before giving you any background. 

I've signed up to Irish Opinions quite a while ago, as a way of getting some much needed cash.  It's one of the numerous pay-for-your-opinion portals that pays you for answering questions like 'What do you think of this particular brand of cheese?'.  Oh, they pay.  I must've cashed about 4 Tesco vouchers by now.  They pay much less than they promise in their ads, but they DO pay, unlike many other portals out there. 

The surveys are mostly boring.  Sometimes unbelievably boring, rarely mildly interesting.  I'm at the bottom edge of their popularity spectrum because I commit the crime of not watching any TV, but that's just my private little grudge, you don't need to agree with that.  The thing, though, I find really, surrealistically, out-of-this-world insane is the sheer absurdity of some questions, which is closely connected to the language marketing uses these days.  Let me give you an example:

How exited are you about this particular design of a cheese packaging?

Exited???  About cheese packaging?  FFS!  Is there anyone there, anyone at all, who gets excited by cheese packaging???  (For the record, I'm making the example up.  I was never actually asked about cheese packaging.  But I was asked about very similar things, using exactly the same vocabulary). 

Just how pitiful your life would have to be for you to get excited about cheese packaging???
The only person whom I can imagine as mildly excited by any product's packaging is the one who actually designed the thing, and only if they really like their job.  Which is quite an alien concept to me but what the hell, there are various sorts out there.

It looks like the marketing guys assume that all of us lead that kind of life, because this type of vocabulary crops up again and again in all kinds of marketing activity. 

The disturbing detail is this - if it didn't work, would they bother still doing it? 
Is the conclusion - yes, it works and we really do go for that kind of bullshit - sound and correct?

If so, I really think we deserve the Armageddon and hope like hell the Doomsayers of 2012 will be proven to be right.

Irony of the Internet

I adore the Internet.  I also quite passionately hate it (for reasons why, see my recent article here).  The sheer strength of these feelings usually stops me from writing anything that isn't a froth-at-the-mouth rant or oversweetened praise.  Unfortunately, ironic and funny pieces are the best read.

How luckily then that other people write about it too.

Here's a piece from The Salmon of Doubt by Douglas Adams, the book I'm reading at the moment (and I don't need to tell you that it gives me heaps of pleasure.  I mean it.  It's not a sales-sarcastic bit, it's a really, really tasty, funny book.  Go to a library if you have to, but read it).  It wonderfully corresponds with my recent rants on marketing bullshit. 

"...Well, first of all its [i.e. a brochure's, or an e-brochure to be precise] job is to persuade people to buy what you have to sell, and do it by being as glossy and seductive as possible and only telling people what you want them to know.  You can't interrogate a brochure.  Most corporate websites are like that.  Take BMW, for instance.  Its Web site is gorgeous and whizzy and it won't answer your questions.  It won't let you find out what other people's experience of owning BMWs is like, what shortcomings any particular model might or might not have, how reliable they are, what they cost to run, what they're like in the wet, or anything like that.  In other words, anything you might actually want to know.  You can e-mail them, but your question or their answer - or anybody else's answer - will not appear on the site.  Of course, there are plenty of Web sites where people do share exactly that kind of information, and they're only a few clicks away, but you won't find a word about them on BMW's site.  In fact, if you want proper, grown-up information about BMW's, the last place you'll find it is at http://www.bmw.com/. ..."

Isn't it brilliant?

And so bloody true?

The art of selling

There must be something to the art of selling, some knack that I'm afraid I'll never get. 

Think logically for a while.  What else is there to marketing than creating a big bullshit and pushing it to people?  The not-exactly-lie-but-not-an-honest-truth-either type of bullshit.  Oh, there are paragraphs for a direct lie in an ad (aren't there???) but what about the indirect one?  Nobody cares. 

Basically someone saying that his product is the best in the world must be either a giant egomaniac or a liar.  As simple as that.

The whole sector of marketing is all about manipulation.  About researching new ways of manipulating people (that is - you) into parting with their money.  Nobody cares is you've had a delicious breakfast or have broadened your horizons.  Once the 'paying' bit is done, nobody gives a shit. 

Just think about it for a second - there's a whole sector out there whose main aim is to deceive you.  To lie to you.  They are well and kicking, they get government grants for scientific development etc, marketing is considered an honourable and successful career.  Yet its whole point is develop new ways in which to lie to you so that you don't realise you're beaing lied to.  Ah, wouldn't that be a perfect ad, when you have no idea why, but you simply have to buy THE thing.  While the marketing guys know perfectly well why, sit and count the cash.

It's all perfectly legal, it's all considered perfectly normal, nobody rebels or argues.  And it's not happening 'somewhere', it's happening here and now, in your home, in mine, on your TV, when you switch on your Internet, when you walk out to the street.  It's all there.  And nobody sees there's something wrong with it.

May it be that we, as a species, simply enjoy being manipulated?  That our TV-softened brains are not able to handle the world without bullshit anymore?