In my mind that can be done by adhering to a few strict guidelines:

1 - Carefully select niche topics where there is enough search volume and low competition.

2 - Write quality, original content, either written by myself or outsourced, that is highly relevant to the selected niche topics.

3 - Build professional looking websites using the chosen niche topics, and keep adding fresh original content to them.

4 - Weave one or two carefully selected, high earning PPC networks into your websites.

All of the above four points are crucial to success and I can’t downplay the importance of any of them. Needless to say however, without a good execution of point 4 your effort in points 1 to 3 may potentially go down the drain. So let’s touch a bit more on that point for now. I will talk more about points 1 to 3 in a future blog.

In my search for reliable, high paying PPC networks with good conversion rates, the 2 outstanding candidates are Google Adsense and InfoLinks intext advertising.

You may have heard about Google Adsense. It is a great contextual ad framework that delivers highly relevant ads to your blog/website, leading to high click through rates (CTR). You nominate specific areas of your websites to display Google Adsense ads.

InfoLinks on the other hand automatically converts relevant keyword phrases on your website into text advertisements. When someone clicks on these words and views the advertisement you’re then credited with some advertising revenue.

In that regard it makes great sense to use InfoLinks together with Google Adsense on the same page, as they compliment each other. InfoLinks does not take up much ad space as their ads are in the text. Used wisely, InfoLinks ads will not be intrusive to visitors while at the same time a great contributor to your website’s bottomline.

So far I have deployed InfoLinks ads on 6 websites. The results have been encouraging. These sites are new, and not all are ranked high in search engines yet. However I’ve seen money coming in, sometimes as high as 3 to 4 dollars for the whole lot of websites a day. I attribute this to the fact that InfoLinks ads are contextually relevant and as a result visitors find their ads related to what they are looking for and are more likely to click on them.

I’m happy with what I see so far with InfoLinks. There’s no doubt if I work hard enough to produce relevant, original website content, and drive enough organic and referrer traffic to my websites, InfoLinks contextual intext ads will make good use of that content and the goal of $1 per website per day in ad revenue (with InfoLinks alone) will not be too far off. The high profit sharing model employed by InfoLinks will also ensure I keep most of the earnings.

OK that’s the roadmap of where I want to go. Why would I want to go down this path? Am I not content with what I already have? Yes I am and there is nothing wrong with my life right now But honestly it could be better. Working 9 to 5 five days a week, 50 weeks in a year never entices me too much. This will not be my first attempt to get out of the rat race, and it may not be the last. But I’m happy I’m giving it a go now, as I will never look back to this day and utter “if only I tried”. Without action the road to financial freedom will be forever far-fetched.

That’s the non-fiction bit. The fiction one, if I may add, and pardon me if I may sound a bit like a day dreamer here. What would I do if somehow someday I did find myself financially free and could  do whatever I want? I can already think of something. I’m sure I wouldn’t mind taking my family on an extended vacation, living somewhere like in Barcelona for 3 months, immersing ourselves in the exotic Spanish culture and cuisine, watching flamingo dancers performing their best moves while we dine at a high class Spanish restaurant. All the while knowing that my online businesses were working on my behalf to earn passive income.

OK enough day dreaming. Time to get back to doing the real elbow grease of building all these websites…

By the way, happy birthday to me! Yay! Yes I turned 35 today and Alexandria marked this occasion with her “blowing the candles 10 times” special performance tonight. May this day be the start of something new in my life, our lives!

Anyway, this particular ceremony was not too bad. First, the hall was very well ventilated so the procession party on stage wasn’t roasted by the high voltage lights that were right on our faces. To get out of a graduation ceremony without a headache is always a very good sign. Second, I got to see the Hon. Steve Bracks, Victoria’s ex-premier as he was receiving a Honorary Doctorate from Deakin University. In person, he is tall, good looking and very charismatic (maybe this alone would be enough for me to vote Labour in the next election!). Third, the refreshment offered afterwards was quite nice. Nothing fancy but the baguette and cookies were very tasty. As an added bonus, the ceremony took place at the new convention centre which happens to be across the road from the South Wharf DFO so I took the opportunity to check out the shopping. To make things even better I found the noodles bowls that I’ve been looking for for so long to add to the ones that I’ve got.

So in retrospect, it wasn’t a bad day. For one thing, it was great to see students being conferred their degrees and finding my long wanted noodle bowls certainly made this particular graduation a positive experience (a little to my surprise I must admit!).

1. Motor skills - since taking her first steps a few days before she was 1, our little sweetheart hadn’t looked back. She’s now a full-fledged toddler who runs around the house and amuses herself with potentially dangerous activities like wrapping herself in the curtains or potentially frustrating (for mum) activities such as going through the pantry and pulling out every single item. For the last two months she has become very intrigued at how things fit together. She loves playing with the seat-belts or anything that involves a buckle. Even opening and closing a bottle would keep her occupied for a little while. She can use a spoon fairly comfortable now to feed herself but unfortunately mum is still doing most of her feeding at home. Never has she been much of a crawler but recently she shows some backward crawling moves which look pretty funny.

2. Language skills - Alex’s first word was “bubble” and I’m at a loss as to why that’s the case. Comfortingly enough,  “mummy” came soon after. As of now, her vocabulary comprises of a mixture of English and Vietnamese words and include bubble, turtle, fish, mummy, daddy, more, no more, bye bye, push, ball, baby, ba` (grandma), mở (open). bóng (ball). Despite her limited vocabulary, Alex has no trouble getting what she wants as we find her screaming quite unpleasant! She also understands a lot and occassionally helps mummy and daddy with a tissue, a remote control or a book.

3. Social skills - Like other toddlers, Alex has a photographic memory (or at least so it seems). She can remember where things are and what things are used for. She copies me to the finest detail which can be scary for me at times. She appears to be a friendly and hospitable kid. She loves having people coming over for a visit and occassional she would play host showing her guests the house. She loves to dance to Hi-5 which is currently her absolute favourite. She has a few dance moves which are quite funky. She seems to have a good feel to rhythm (I’d like to think that she got that from me!). But her most amazing ability is posing for pictures. Her face is naturally full of expressions but she certainly knows how to make herself look good in the picture. So it appears that we have a good daugher-parents team where the parents love to take pictures and the daugher loves to be in the pictures.

It is getting late so I can only guarantee the accuracy but not the completeness of those facts. However, there’s always tomorrow and anyhow I’ve promised myself that I would write more often.