You might have seen so many websites that offer you chances and opportunities to make money online at your own home or at work. It may seem very convenient and very easy to do. It’s like a miracle enterprise that promises to give money and make you rich instantly.
However, you should choose what kind of online business you want to do carefully. First you have to think of the advantages of owning an online business. In difference to real world shops your online business will be open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You don’t need employees to run your online business, therefore, no need for extra office space. And lastly, you can work from your own home easily and you’ll have more time for yourself.
There is a wide variety of online businesses that you can do. Choose one that interests you. If you have no interests in fishing starting a fishing website is obviously something you should avoid.
Here are some ways to make an extra buck on the internet. It is very imporant to be aware that you won’t make money overnight! You need to start small and once profits start coming in re-invest.
Affiliate programs
This is one of the most popular ways to make money online. All you need is a theme-based website and targeted internet traffic. Many companies are willing to pay you if you promote their products in whatever way you can. - Of course spamming is a big NO, NO. - To do this, you first need a theme-based website with a specific topic. Think of something that interests you, like your hobby or your previous work, write an article about it and post it on your website. After your website is up and running, with all the buttons functioning the way they should be, sign up with a company as an affiliate.
The company you sign up with as an affiliate should be selling products or services that are relevant to your website’s theme or topic. The company will then give you a link to post on your website, it may be a banner or it may be just a text link. After you posted the company’s banner or text link, keep in mind that the company will not pay you by just posting their link. They require you to get them visitors from your website to buy their products; this is where you get your commission.
The real work begins.
The key to success when trying to make money from affiliate programs is targeted internet traffic. What targeted traffic means is that the visitors on your website should be people who are interested in what you are discussing, and since what you’re discussing is relevant to the servicess offered by the affiliate program you are promoting, visitors might consider buying something from the affiliate company.
To get targeted traffic, one of the most common and easy methods is by writing articles and posting them at article publishing websites. Always include your website’s URL after every article you write. Do not just write an article about anything; this will not get you targeted internet traffic. Write about something about your website’s topic. By doing this, readers will be interested in what you’re advertising on your website.
Taking Online Surveys
Companies will actually pay you just to get your opinion about their products. Surveys are like product research and development; companies are using the internet to get people’s opinion so they can effectively sell their product or services. All you have to do is sign up with a survey company and then they will send you surveys via email.
Most companies will pay you five to ten dollars for every survey you take, depending on how long the survey is. The number of surveys that will be sent to you are low, so it is a good idea to sign up with as many survey companies as you can to get a sufficient income.
There are more ways to make extra money online; some of them require you to store products. But if you want to make money immediately, you definitely should consider affiliate programs and online surveys.
For most good online marketers it took at least a year to get up and running to get successful. They had to budget their time and money well. Don’t assume that putting a huge sum of cash into your business will bring you instant rewards. It is important to spend your time and money on several different approaches to see which ones generate the best hits. You need to remember to be persistent and spend your time and money wisely. When you fail to plan you plan to fail at your business. You want to find targeted visitors that are interested in what you have if you want to make sales.
1. Build Your List
Most online marketers send their offers to many targeted sources and prospects that they have generated. They do this regularly and have great success. It will allow you to build a lasting and trustful relationship with the list members. As the trust grows so will your money. There have been plenty of marketers who have made thousands just from sending an e-mail to their lists.
2. Pay Per Click search engines.
This type of search engine is the way to build high volume traffic immediately. Many hosts will be more than happy to set you up with this and you will be able to see how many people have been to your site. You will also end up paying less per month. You will also want to get Wordtracker to get as many targeted keywords as possible. The more targeted keywords you get the more traffic to your sites.
3. Article Submissions
You want to provide free and interesting articles related to what you are trying to sell to your audience. This will inform them on the benefits of what you are promoting and give it worth. Make sure your articles are truthful and not plagiarized.
4. Regular Search Engines
You will want to get started immediately to be able to build an online web presence. This will help to promote your site and gain you ranking which will move you to the top of the list. The higher on the list of ranking you are the more hits you will generate. You can link your self to a reciprocal linking campaign. This will give you the highest success in search engine rankings than anything else.
5. Forum Posting
A great way to target your market is to join a forum that is geared towards your audience. You can become friends and be helpful with all the people. This will let you gain trust. You want to be friends with your customers when marketing on the net. Visit and join high traffic forums daily and share your experiences with them and offer any advice as much as you can.
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So you’ve decided to have an online business. Before you start having those big cash flow dreams, stop and get some tips for having an online business. There are many internet information resources for doing this sort of thing. However, the basic tips for an online business are very close to those of a traditional business. Here are some basics:
• Write a business plan and revise that plan periodically. Your business plan should be thought of as a living document. As with any business, you will initially find out what works and what does not work and will have to change your plan accordingly.
• Be very careful about buying webspace and pre-packaged website templates for your business (the “we will build your website” people). You’ll find that down the road it will be difficult to change the site plus get source code to it. You are better off outsourcing the web design with a freelancer and purchasing your own domain and installing the site yourself.
• Make sure you follow all security measures when running a site that accepts credit cards for purchases.
• If you expect to receive a lot of phone calls, you may want to consider hiring an answering service.
• Run your online business like a business. You will need to discipline yourself with working hours to take care of all offsite matters because you will have them. A lot of people make the mistake of treating their internet business merely as a website, which can be very detrimental because running an online business requires an approach that you would have with an offline business.
• Your marketing plan needs to include search engine optimization (SEO). This is important because you want your site to rank in the top 10 of search engine query results. You would be wise to study SEO techniques or hire the services of a SEO consultant.
• Some other marketing ideas include posting your web address on the back windshield of your vehicle or coordinating with other websites to include a backlink to your site. Word of mouth is always one of the best tools for advertising your site. With the advent of Google Adword, Overture and other similar advertising, it is possible to drive targeted traffic to your site by finding keywords that have very low bids. You will be able to measure your conversion ratio of such traffic with sales in realtime.
Customer service is even more critical as customers do not “see” you and building trust with them is a little harder. Performance builds trust.
There’s nothing innocent about the word “downloading” nowadays. Several years back when Pentium Pro?, Windows 95? and 28.8 kbps modems were the buzzword in the computer world, downloading was just a method for people to get free or trial software (applications, games, documents etc.) off some website or ftp site. Less than a decade later, downloading has almost become synonymous with piracy as its function extended into shady areas neighboring on the unlawful. Three factors contributed to this trend. Computer chips, having to answer to Moore’s Law, have sped up exponentially. Broadband internet connections which makes downloading of sizeable files at faster rates, are now commonplace. That takes care of the hardware and data conduit aspect. On the software side of things, the arrival of peer-to-peer and torrent applications have unquestionably made it easier for people to download bootlegged video, music and software among other things. This is the golden age of digital piracy.
The fact that the internet traverses both borders and cultures, laws that are in effect in one country becomes ineffective and even useless in another. What’s more obvious is a difference in perception as to what is considered piracy and what is not. Then again, for some unscrupulous individuals, they just want to get something for nothing. Now, since all the necessary tools are readily available to anyone who’s aspiring to be a cyber buccaneer, what can be done to curve illegal downloads? The strong movement for a mass education campaign in teaching the public about piracy and its damaging effect to the economy has been ongoing. It aims to make people understand that just because intellectual properties like software and digital music are somewhat intangible, it doesn’t mean they’re free. Hopefully, we’ll see the fruits of this campaign in the very near future. To the rescue are blogs and websites that advocate legal downloads. They aren’t as many as torrent sites but the few ones that exist are extremely helpful and interesting.
What these blogs and sites bring to the table are very compelling articles and anecdotes that talk about anything and everything that has to do with legal downloads. Reading them will surely sway some people to step up and do downloads the right way, effectively steering some crowd away from doing downloads of the frowned upon kind. Although there is no way around to having to pay for commercial songs, software or videos, these blogs do provide plenty of tips and how-to’s on really free and legal downloads. There are guides that point you to the correct direction, sparing you from having to sweat searching for sites where you can make those socially approved downloads.
Technology and all of its components are constantly advancing in ways that will bring it to near perfection in the future. Without doubt, software security is somewhere on top of that ever changing and improving landscape. It is hard to predict when it will happen but digital piracy will be a thing of the past. In the meantime, sites that advocate legal downloads will be a haven for people of uncompromising principles.
Everybody wants to earn money! So rather than spending your time just goofing around, you can try doing business at your home or even at your office on the side or as full time. You just need an internet connection and money is just a click of the mouse away.
It is easy to think of a business but it is hard to control it. With an online business, you are the boss of your own business, you earn at the same time you enjoy your life. The task on your part is easy, some mouse clicks and the right idea will lead you to profit.
One way to earn money easily is through making your own website. How can you make money out of it? Easy. This is where you will post or publish your product if you are going to sell something. You can also add your personal information if you want to apply for work.
There are a lot of things that you can do with your personalized site. You need to grab all the chances that will come to you, when people come and visit your site. This will be your doorway to your new career.
To start with your site, check out the following tips:
1. Do some brainstorming - This is the stage at which you can come up with so many ideas. Among all the ideas that come out of your mind, choose the best. You will determine your entire plan for your site. The style that you want or even the business that you want to start, all these should be the result of your brainstorming.
2. Assess and be consistent on your target market- After going over all the concepts of your site, choose a target market. This will include the customers that you will have. Usually, it varies from age brackets and status or profession of a person.
3. Estimate the time and money that you have to exert and spend on your business- All of these factors will affect your profit so it is necessary that you have an estimated cost. You need to be aware fo the fact that the more money or gain that you want the more time you will also spend with your site.
4. Create your website name- Your primary consideration is to create a name that will attract the attention of visitors. They will be more interested to search on your website if it has a pleasing name.
5. Hire a professional- If you do not know how to do web design, hire a professional. A professional web designer can help you with your problem. If you want your site to look really professional you have to hire a professional!
6. Upload your website- If everything is fixed and you are now ready to let people view your site, then upload it.
If you intend to sell products from your site, you need a way to accept payments. You can apply for a merchant account or use one of the many third party credit card processing companies like paypal, 2checkout, or stormpay.
After your website is up and running you need to promote it. A website without visitors won’t make any money. So web promotion is one of the most important things if you want to make money from your website. There are thousands of free ebooks, reports, articles, and online courses available that will teach you how to attract visitors and how to improve search engine ranking. Just go to your favorite search engine and search for e.g. “web promotion free ebook”.
So, good luck to your business!
As you read these words, there are millions of people making a full-time income on the internet, working part-time hours from the comfort of their own home. These people set their own working hours, live wherever they choose to live and have a ton of spare time (and money) to spend with their family and friends, simply doing things they love to do.
Does this sound like something you would like to be doing?
Well, rest assured, you’ve made the right decision if you would… Because you’re about to learn everything you need to know to get started on your internet business and be pointed in the right direction towards online business success.
In this guide, you’ll not only learn the basics to starting an internet business but you’ll also learn about the many different online business models you can choose.
You can even analyze over 50 successful online businesses which you can then imitate!
But before we get started, just so you’re as excited as I am about doing business online.
Here are some of the main reasons most people decide to start an online business:
• It takes very little money to start
Unlike a business in the “real world”, an online business DOES NOT need a lot of start up money. All you need is an idea, a domain name, internet access and hosting…all of which can be obtained for very little indeed.
• You choose when you work
Who says you must work from 9 to 5 everyday? People who are NOT Internet Business owners!
The Internet Business is the biggest proof why the statement “working from 9 to 5” is no longer true. With an Internet Business, you don’t have to wake up in the wee hours of the morning so that you can get to work by 9am anymore. You can start work at anytime since you’re your own boss!
• Work from the comfort of your own home
Where you put your computer is where you’ll be working! And since you’re going to be working from home, you’ll be saving at least two hours of your time each day by not having to travel to and from your work place - during rush hours when everybody else is going to work or heading home.
That means you’ll be saving at least 730 hours a year! Wouldn’t you shudder at the thought of wasting 730 hours a year doing nothing productive?
• With the internet, the whole world is your market!
By sitting in front of the computer, everyone in the world is now within your reach. You leverage on free or low-cost software and hardware and the Internet Infrastructure, all of which when combined will give you leveraging power that far exceeds any conventional business, allowing you to achieve more and more with less and less work!
• You can fully automate your online business
If properly set up, some Internet Business models can be fully automated. I have a number of fully automated income streams at present.
• No need to work 8 hours a days every single day
Once you’ve automated your Internet Business in some way, you can use the time you save to start other income streams, improve your existing business, or however you like.
You just spend the time online checking your e-mail, promoting and expanding your business &ndash all in front of your computer. And there’s absolutely no need to spend even more than four hours online.
• Spend more time with family and friends
Owning an Internet Business allows you to spend more time with your family, or watch your children grow up. This is what most busy parents crave for.
If you’re one of them, then you’ll do well to seriously consider starting an Internet Business.
• Your online business can be all about your hobbies and passions
And this is my favorite reason for anybody wanting to start an Internet Business! The Internet Business allows your passion and dream to come to life, which is also the most important component of any businesses.
• Online businesses have very little expenses
Believe it or not, some Internet Businesses can be set up and running at zero cost, if not a very low cost. Other Internet Businesses can be run with monthly operational expenses so low that they’re negligible!
• You can have more that one!
Since the cost of setting up and running an Internet Business is so low, and you can automate their operations, you can operate multiple Internet Businesses as a one-person Internet Business owner. You don’t need to hire employees since your Internet Business system is doing most of the job, if not all, for you. It works 24/7 for you. It won’t call in sick. It won’t give any excuses. And it definitely won’t blame you if it ever had problems!
• The internet is a huge market (the whole world) and it’s getting bigger as you read these words
According to the Computer Industry Almanac, there were 934 million Internet users up to September 2004; and there will be 1.07 billion in this year.
Now, is there any doubt that a 934 million-user pool is a very attractive target given the leverage you have on the Internet?
Given all the wonderful reasons for starting your very own Internet Business, I’m sure that by now you have already made up your mind whether starting an Internet Business is for you…
If you are new to Internet Marketing and finding it difficult to get started, you’re not alone. You probably search the Internet for so long that you found yourself back at the same starting point, but with a lot of hype and information overload. Odds are your asking the same question, “How Do I Get Started?” Fortunately there is an easy way, and best of all you don’t need a web site.
Many people think in order to start a business or sell a product they need a web site. The typical process would be:
- Find a product that can be sold or promoted. This can be anything from an affiliate program to buying resell rights or private label rights for ebooks or software.
- Build a website that requires finding a web hosting provider, design the site, and creating content.
- Promote the website and product by advertising, link exchanges and any other method that will drive traffic to your site.
If you take one part from each of the three processes above you will have: a product from joining an affiliate program, creating content for distribution, and promoting it.
The process now looks like this:
- Join a good affiliate program. This can be any kind of service or digital goods such as ebooks or software. After signing up for an affiliate program you will receive a link that will include your affiliate ID.
- Create informative quality content about the product.
- Promote the product.
The last step is the key on how to promote the product without a website. Instead of creating the content for a website, create it in the form of articles, blogs, ezines, or even an eBook. Here’s how:
Articles - Write an article by creating content which is relevant to the product. The most important part of the article is the resource box at the bottom (see below), or sometimes shown as ‘About the Author”. This should include a short description of how to find more information for the product and include the link that points to the site selling the product or service. Once you submit the article, it will be picked up by web site owners looking for fresh content. Finding article sites are not hard since there are hundreds to choose from on the Internet.
Blogs - One of the hottest and effective method for selling. Best of all a website is not needed and it’s free. Just create content similar to writing articles and naturally weave your links in the blog. Update the blog once a week and keep using your important keywords. Your blog will be distributed through feeds and will also be crawled by the search engines. If you do your homework, you may end up on the first page of Google by using good keywords!
Advertise - Many people may opt not to advertise because of the costs, but if you plan your advertising campaigns carefully, they will pay for themselves quickly. If your budget is tight, look for free classifieds ads.
Forums - Visit the online discussion forums where people in your target market like to gather. Post useful responses to people’s questions, and include any links that you want to promote at the end of your post next to your name. You may be surprise at the results.
E-Mail Signatures - Create an e-mail signature with your name, link, and a short tagline describing the main benefit of your product. Set your e-mail program to automatically add your signature to every e-mail that you send.
These are just some methods you can use to market products with out a website. Start out with the examples above and learn how to create quality content and effectively distribute them around the Internet. Based on this knowledge, you can begin to build a solid foundation for your business which will help you make money instead of ending up at the beginning from where you started!
You need to make some money. Perhaps you’d like to change careers. Maybe you’d like a new challenge. Or you’ve just heard the rumors about the fortunes to be made on the internet.
Any one of these reasons might have led you to the decision to start your own internet business, but before you begin investing your time and money there are some important questions you need to answer to determine if an ebusiness is right for you.
First you should consider your familiarity and ease with the internet. If you don’t know about negotiate the web or attempting to do makes you uncomfortable then this alone does not mean you should rethink starting an ebusiness. However it does mean that you need to spend time learning about how the internet works and getting familiar with basic tools such as email, web browsers, message boards, and search engines. If your discomfort was a simple result of ignorance then don’t worry about it as you can acquire the knowledge and skills you need. However if you find that you simply don’t like it even after you become familiar then that should be a red flag to consider another career path.
Second you should consider your business knowledge and experience and then consider how that works for you or against you in the world of ecommerce. A simple lack of knowledge and experience simply means that you will need to spend time learning or filling in the gaps in your knowledge. The good news is that this information is readily available on the internet. Of course the bad news is that if you leap into business before you are ready it can cost you a lot of time and money. My advice is to read articles and ebooks to acquire a basic foundation then begin spending time in some online forums and ask questions. People are always willing to help. Don’t spend any money while building this foundation knowledge. You don’t have to so why do it? Latter on as you begin to delve deeper into your niche then you may decide that some information is worth paying for but hopefully by then you’ll be a better judge. However you may discover during your studies that ecommerce bores you or confuses you. Again, that should be a red flag to consider another career path.
Third what need will your ebusiness fill? Obviously you have needs but that is not what I’m talking about. Think about your potential audience or customer. Start searching for other products that might compete with yours or other businesses that already exist. Visit forums, subscribe to newsletters, and study web sites that relate to this field. Eventually you will be able to determine if there is a need for your ebusiness, how big a demand exists, and how much competition is already in place. It is important to consider these angles because each fact will help determine how easy it will be to establish your new business, grow that business, and ensure its success. You can make a success in a highly competitive field but it is more work than finding yourself in a smaller, yet unexplored, niche.
One of the most serious problems with any blogging system, including WordPress, is that the comments area is wide open to that scourge of the Internet, spammers. In this case, it’s comment spam.
Comment spam is created by people seeking to boost their Google rankings by having lots of links pointing to their own websites. This causes a wide variety of problems:
• When Google detects content spam, they will often block the site it’s coming from because it messes up their ranking system.
• It takes up your valuable time and bandwidth to eliminate these posts.
• If the onslaught of spam is heavy enough, it may result in a denial-of-service attack, intended or not, which is a situation in which the server tries so hard to post bad information and/or deliver notification emails to you that it denies service to the legitimate requests. In at least one case, a blogger received over two thousand email notifications of comments that needed approval; as he dealt with these, he continued getting more, ultimately crashing his mail server.
As you can see, even if you have your comments set to post only upon approval, this can be a serious problem. One solution is the Akismet plugin for WordPress.
Akismet Plugin and Other Plugin Options for WordPress
Akismet is designed to help you filter out those nasty spammers, and it’s not hard to get it installed into your WordPress system. Download the plugin, and upload it to the blog directory on your server in the plugins subdirectory under wp-content. Activate from the WordPress plugins menu. If you have a notice that you need the Akismet API, go to the WordPress website and look or ask for one.
Here’s the magic: the only instruction in Akismet is “forget that spam was ever a problem.” You don’t have to do anything else at all &ndash the spam will simply be bounced. You will not receive a notification, nor will you have to go out and delete spam.
Another plugin for eliminating spam from bots is the “Did You Pass Math” plugin. This one makes the user perform a simple math problem before submitting a comment. As most humans can handle this and most spambots can’t, it’s pretty likely that a comment posted through this is a legitimate comment. You should add a note of caution that your comments will be deleted if you answer the math wrong, though; a wise commenter will use an offline composition tool, not post directly to the comments area.
If This Still Doesn’t Work
If you still can’t eliminate spammers with these plugins, you can eliminate them by denying them access to your comments area. This does not mean you have to disable your comments section, only that you need to set up a filter.
It’s not usually as simple as just blocking their IPs. Serious spammers use random IPs, while blocking IPs may get rid of them for a short time, it will ultimately prevent legitimate comments from being posted. Spammers are also notorious for hijacking other people’s IP addresses. But as a short-term emergency solution, you can try it. The IP address is included in the information packet for the comment; it’s similar to a traceable phone number. Look for clear patterns in your IP numbers.
Use the .htaccess file to block unwanted IPs from even seeing your blog. For instance, these lines can be added:
order allow,deny
deny from 123.123.123.123
deny from 456.456.456.*
deny from 789.789.*.*
allow from all
IPs are four-part numbers, such as 192.168.0.1. Typically, if you see a pattern with the first two sections being identical, you can block all IPs of that type by simply listing them as 192.168.*.*, as you see above. This screens out all these IP numbers. Blocked IPs will get a 403 error page; customize yours so that your contact details are listed in case you’re blocking out a legitimate user. Don’t use your regular email; a spammer can harvest that too, for a whole new set of problems. Instead, encode your email so that it’s not automatically readable.
When you think you have your problems addressed, you can remove the block from your .htaccess file. If it still doesn’t work, or if you don’t see an IP pattern, it’s likely that spambots are hijacking someone else’s machine to attack your site. In this case, do not use the IP block.
Again, if you don’t have an IP pattern of attack, this may not be worth doing. Remember, too, that with IP addresses, the first numbers affect the largest number of computers, like a reverse address: USA, California, Sacramento, X Building, Ste. 101, Joe Schmo. An IP follows roughly the same pattern, with the last of the four sections referring to the specific computer it is attached to.
Google’s Nofollow Attribute
Of course, if it’s a waste of their time to spam you, spammers may just skip you altogether. For this reason, you can use the Google Nofollow attribute for links: . This attribute is embedded automatically by modern versions of WordPress.
It does not eliminate links, which is what spammers are working on adding to your site. Instead, it makes those links irrelevant to Google. The end result is that it doesn’t hurt your rank in Google, and it doesn’t help a spammer to send data to your site. It also marks you, for spambots looking for an easy target, as a waste of time.
This is not an immediate fix. But it is a way to make your blog resistant to spammers in the future. If you’re already a target, you’ll have to work with it slowly, incorporating all these fixes. If you aren’t a target, the very least you should do is turn on the nofollow option in your WordPress system; this will deter any hungry spambots. Upgrade your version, or look for one of the plugins that provides this service for you.
If you’re like most people who start a blog, you initially have a bit of writer’s block. Good news- it will likely go away, and you’ll find yourself thinking of new things to blog about frequently. In fact blogging becomes quite addictive.
This was certainly true of me. When I began blogging, I would often struggle with things to blog about. Now, I have the problem of not having enough time to post on all the things I want to talk about!
Here are a few tips to get you through that initial dry spell until you find your blogging voice.
1) Subscribe to other blog feeds for your industry/target market.
If you have a blog about babies and toddlers, you’ll want to have other similar (preferably high traffic) blogs on your RSS reader. It’s a good way to keep abreast of what’s going on in the collective consciousness of people. Just do a Google search for blog + topics of choice, and you’ll come up with plenty.
Keeping up with other blogs in your niche means that you can link to their posts (and you should always link to a blog that inspires your own post!) and add your own “spin” on the subject.
2) Look at trade magazines and newspapers in your niche
Again, going back to the baby/toddler theme, read parenting magazines. Magazines are a great place to look for inspiration…the articles are mostly short, pithy, “quick fix” and solution oriented (similar to blog posts). They also change to reflect what’s going on in the world and with your target market.
Keeping up with the news is also a good idea…you can find news feeds to add to your RSS reader too. When something is happening in the world that impacts your target market, blog it.
3) Keep a notebook (or file on your desktop) of blog fodder
When a thought or sentence hits you, write it down immediately. These sentences can be lengthened into blog posts (and later lengthened into articles…that’s another ecourse!). The more you do this, the more aware you will become of the unlimited topics you can blog about, even in your niche.
4) Milk Your Content
If you’re publishing a newsletter and write articles, then blog a short intro paragraph along with a link to the rest of the content on your website.
5) Product Reviews
Review products that you’ve tried and books you’ve read that relate to your niche. Anything that would help your blog readers make a decision (and we all need that help in a world with too many choices!) is a good thing.
6) Involve Your Visitors
Your newsletter subscribers and blog readers can be marketing partners and content generators for you! How? When they email you with a question, ask their permission to post it (along with the answer) on your blog.
May you soon find yourself in the predicament of so many blog posts, so little time!