Posted 6/17/08 - Kellex

I know I’ve slumped in the last month on the networking front and my stats will be feeling it at the end of this month. In my first 2.5 months I had a Technorati authority of 50+ and since then I’ve added just 12 more and have been stuck at 62 for quite some time. (Slacker!) It’s time to jump back on the networking wagon with a quick refresher on our top 5 tips…

1. Commenting (Yes I brought it up again!) - It really is a huge deal if you want to make some friends that will continue to link, participate and spread the word on your blog. I’m am the worst at this and always tell myself that I don’t have time, but the truth is, I need to make time.

2. Link Lists – Almost as important as commenting and some would argue that it is more important. You’ll notice that we ran our “DollarBall” post yesterday for the first time in a while because it’s time to start growing again. Link it up to your peers and the chances of them returning the favor are pretty high.

3. Guest Posts – Asked anyone if you could guest post lately? This is something many of us feel uncomfortable doing, but it’s also something that you have to do. What’s surprising about guest posting, is your idea machine (brain) immediately starts flowing once someone says “yes.” Your post will likely be better than your every day posts and should help bring in a ton of new readers to your niche.

4. Social Bookmarking – We’ve hammered the hell out of this in the past and will continue to until something better comes along. Through our search bar or category list you can find tons of information on these with our favorites being Stumble Upon, YardBarker, and BallHype. We don’t mention Digg all that much anymore as it has basically become useless to sports bloggers unless you have a new and creative video that no one has seen before. YardBarker at this point, tends to be dominating the rest.

5. Interviews – Plain and simple, ask someone if you can interview them! Think about how you would feel if someone asked to interview you. Would feel good huh? I’m not sure that anyone, aside from maybe a pro blogger, has turned down an interview when asked. Throw together a quick 5-10 question list and send it off in a well written email. You may have instantly gained a reader just by asking!

Time to join ClickBooth to help monetize your site, don't you think?

Posted 6/10/08 - Kellex

This is a very nice free tool that can be used to see many things including whether or not your current layout is optimized correctly. If you are not familiar with Crazy Egg, you should go to their site now to check it out and start running a free test.

The tool allows you to track a certain number of visitors to your site and keeps track of what the visitors are clicking on by showing you in a clean and visual manner. I would recommend that you run a test on your index or main page to see what your readers are clicking on the most. From there you can pick other pages to run the test on such as your most popular Google searched page or a new linkbait piece you have just released.

This will give you a pretty good idea if your ads are receiving enough action and if your site needs some adjustment.

Let me know if you have any questions!


Have you signed up for the PepperJAM Network and eBay.com, their newest affiliate?

Posted 5/13/08 - Kellex


Over the past couple of weeks my basketball blog has been hurting from either a lack of motivation, me being too freakin' busy, or just an uninspired mind. It has gotten so bad that earlier today I wrote a post about how sorry I was to have lost touch with my readers.

After writing it, I soon was hit up with emails and remarks asking if I was "OK" and "What was going on with my blog?" It only took the first email to realize that I needed to pull my head out of my arse and leave much of the BS I've been doing behind to start focusing on writing material like I'm capable of.

When you are really at a loss for motivation or ideas, the best thing you can do is find a close friend or reader. Not only were my readers and friends offering me their own ideas, but they even offered to start writing for me! (Crazy huh?)

It has truly been an inspirational day that I hope I never have to encounter again. Thanks to you all for making this possible!


Have you signed up for PepperJAM Network and Review ME yet?

Posted 4/16/08 - Kellex

Still looking to build linkbacks or traffic? Ever thought about a weekly link post?

We run DollarBall a couple of times a month just to let those other blogs out there know that we exist and we appreciate their work. We also run a link post called LINKBAWL over at our basketball blog that is dedicated to the hot basketball stories of the day or week. These are two examples you could use to start up your post.

Most bloggers just LOVE to get linked up by other blogs. It feeds their ego a little bit but also lets them know they have a reader. (Of course they really love linkbacks because it brings in traffic from that other blog.) Many blogs also try to thank others for the love they give and in most cases will attempt to link back to you.

Don’t feel the need to run this thing everyday! Many blogs do and I’m not actually sure how the hell they find the time to do this, but more power to them. (Make sure you can stick to some sort of schedule once you decide on a link post, because your readers will get used to the great info!)

Got a better way to get noticed in the blogging community than to link another blog? When you come up with one that is free, let me know!

Posted 4/10/08 - Kellex

One possibility you may have once your blog becomes successful is the option of selling it. It seems a little odd that you could sell a blog to someone and then the next day start up a new one doesn't it? Well people do it all the time!

Yesterday John Cow wrote up a piece on "How much is your blog worth?" and then today wrote a sort of "part 2" to that by announcing that John Cow dot com is up for sale. In the initial post he goes into detail on how you can actually sell a blog and also how to figure out how much it is worth. (Sorry not posting our numbers at this time.) :)

In the future, this may be something to think about if you have a very unique domain name or you have steady traffic numbers. John Cow dot com is sitting at around 1600+ subscribers while averaging 40k unique visitors per month. Now those numbers are great but don't compare to some of the larger sites like Shoemoney.com.

Sites like this or this will help you sell your blog.

As your blog continues to grow, hopefully with our help and many other sites, selling is an option to keep in mind.

Posted 4/8/08 - Kellex

Yesterday, I sat down and wrote out the 50 Reasons Being an NBA Blogger is the “S”. This was essentially me figuring out why I really love what I do, which is blogging. For me, this list came pretty easy. Sure I had some fun with it, but coming up with 50 reasons only took about 30 minutes. From there, the time consuming part was linking to topics on there or poking fun at them. It felt good to release my feelings toward being an NBA blogger while giving credit to friends at the same time.

So today’s quick tip is a question you should ask of yourself. Do you love blogging? And not only that, but can you come up with 50 reasons why you love blogging in your niche? If you can’t you may need to make a harsh decision on whether or not you should be doing this. Maybe you just need a new blog child or maybe you just need to mold your blog topic into another niche that has more opportunities.

Blogging definitely takes a lot more work than many of you could imagine. And you never know, maybe this list will feed some more ideas into that blogworthy brain of yours. Plus, Digg users may just love it!

Posted 4/6/08 - Kellex

This is a great tip to speed up your Firefox browser. Wait, still using IE? Come up people, that is sooooooo 4 year ago!

Follow these steps and you will see a dramatic increase in your Firefox page load times:

1. Type “about:config” into the address bar and hit return. Type “network.http” in the filter field, and change the following settings (double-click on them to change them):
2. Set “network.http.pipelining” to “true”
3. Set “network.http.proxy.pipelining” to “true”
4. Set “network.http.pipelining.maxrequests” to 30. This will allow it to make 30 requests at one time. Originally I tried 100 here and it didn’t seem to help. When I went with 30 I noticed an improvement. ** Update 8 is actually recommended by Firefox **
5. Right-click anywhere and select New-> Integer. Name it “nglayout.initialpaint.delay” and set its value to “0″. This value is the amount of time the browser waits before it acts on information it receives.

Posted 4/4/08 - Kellex

If you are really serious about this blogging thing, then you need to take the $10 plunge and buy your own domain. That Blogspot or WordPress address isn’t going to cut it if you are looking to make it big. Not only does it help your site with instant credibility, it also saves you from some problems if you decide to switch to your own domain down the road.

I had started a blog, put in a ton of work and decided 2 months in that I should probably switch to a .com domain. Sure enough I made the switch and everything seemed great, at first. What I didn’t realize is your Technorati authority essentially starts over at “0”, your sitemap needs reset, your Google Analytics needs reset, and so does any other stat tracking device on your blog. And don’t forget that PageRank you may have worked extra hard to get! It is good to note that Blogger will redirect everything to your new domain which helps with all those links you already have spread around the web. (I’m sure WordPress does this as well.)

If you are really serious about this blogging world, my suggestion is to purchase the domain early and not deal with the pesky details somewhere in the future.

Posted 4/2/08 - Kellex

I was fortunate enough in my blog life today to interview Pat Croce who is the new commissioner of SlamBall. You probably know Pat from other ventures including his ownership of the Philadelphia 76ers. He was the owner during the Iverson days and brought an Eastern Conference championship to the team with a run to the NBA Finals. His success is everywhere and the guy has the most incredible energy that speaks volumes, even through a phone.

So today’s quick tip is to go out and interview someone! Not only can a big name bring you some much needed traffic but it also gets you exposed to something you may have never done before. Interviewing a celebrity or star can seem intimidating but you’ll never really know the experience until you conduct one yourself. After some practice, you’ll find yourself understanding how the process works and in time will become more comfortable.

Start out small and grab a fellow blogger that you admire or take a stab at a prominent sports writer. You would be surprised at the positive feedback you may get from many bloggers or writers out there.

Read my interview with Pat Croce here.

Posted 4/1/08 - Kellex

Do you have a solid list of blogs you read every day? No? Yes? I’m hoping that answer was “yes” which is without a doubt a good thing. As a blogger, you should already know the top dogs in your niche and you should already have subscribed to their feed. These are the guides to help your blog grow into that money making machine.

Make sure you are reading each of theses blogs daily! Remember these are the top dogs and they obviously know what they are doing. Pick up the little things they do that grab a few extra ‘hypes’ from BallHype or Digg. Most top dogs are not re-inventing the wheel; they are just adding an extra spoke here or there.

Not reading a list yet? Bad blogger! You might want to get on this in a hurry. Here are a few of the top sports blogs to give you a head start.

The Big Lead
SPORTSbyBROOKS
Deadspin
With Leather
True Hoop
Baseball Prospectus

To see more, visit our Top 50 Sports Blogs!

Posted 3/31/08 - Kellex

Guest blogging is easily one of the greatest forms of traffic building you can utilize. Not only does it change up your normal routine, it also allows you to network with your favorite blogs and possibly develop some blogger friendships.

The process is pretty easy. Simply pick out one of your favorite blogs and ask its author or owner if they would be interested in writing a guest post for your site. If they say “no” you have nothing to worry about, but if they say “yes” you have just scored some significant traffic depending on the site.

Once they have posted their article they will likely link to it from their own blog which will send their traffic on over to yours and give you a nice boost. Of course if you ask another new blogger to guest blog, you may not see the optimal traffic results as they are struggling for traffic just as much as you are. The thing to remember is that you are still building relationships whether or not you get that immediate boost in traffic. Realize that you have just gained some respect with a peer.

Don’t be scared to ask!

We are also running a guest blogging program and are looking for any volunteers. Shoot us an email at thesportsdollar@gmail.com!

Posted 3/27/08 - Kellex

I think we're all into this Entrecard thing and not really sure where it is going to take us right? We click and click and drop and drop and never really see much. It may get you some traffic, but is it really the kind of traffic anyone wants? Talk about screwing up your Google Analytics with an average pageview time of 2 seconds?

Either way, we are still obsessed at this point and think that raising the number of credits to advertise on our blog is going to mean something special! Maybe some day.

Until then, here is a quick tip to help you dominate Entrecard and not waste hours a day trying to build up your credits and stats.

First off, you need Mozilla Firefox to do this. IE7 could be considered the worst program on the face of the Earth.

The main trick here is to use Firefox's tab'd browsing with shortcuts to whip through the Entrecarding process. Start with a category that has 40-50 blogs in it total like 'Books.' Begin at the top with the first blog and right click "Open in new tab." Do this for the first 2 rows which should give you 11 total tabs open including your main Entrecard tab.

Now make sure you start with your second tab and it's time to fly through these!

Use CTRL+TAB to go from tab to tab and click on the link Entrecard provides you to their blog. Once all of the tabs load the individuals sites you use CTRL+TAB again to tab through each blog while dropping. Once you have dropped your card you can hit CTRL+W to close the tab to clear up space!

Your Entrecard List:

1. Open a small campaign
2. Right click and "Open in new tab" the first 2 rows of the campaign
3. CTRL+ TAB through each to click on the link to the blog's site
4. CTRL+TAB through again while dropping your cards
5. CTRL+W to close each tab after dropping

Once you get the hang of this, you can drop hundreds within minutes. Practice it up and let me know how it's working!

Posted 3/26/08 - Kellex

Pull up your site, roll back a few feet and gaze into its mysteriousness for a minute. Is it hurting your eyes? Is it too tough to read? Is there too much flashy crap? Does it look amateur? Is it pathetic?

If you just answered “yes” to all of these, it may be time for a website overhaul. Your website should be functional and still optimized for making money. It should not be scaring people away or burning out their retinas! It should look clean and you should be able to decide what your color scheme is within seconds. I shouldn’t be able to scroll down your page and see 15 different link colors and another 15 flashing 125x125 buttons. I also shouldn’t see a 100 link long blogroll. There truly is such thing as “overkill.”

Now I’m not saying to follow exactly what I’ve done with The Sports Dollar but I am saying that a cleaner approach with a little professionalism goes a long way. Isn’t the goal here to impress as many people as possible?

Go find yourself a new template if you’ve decided your blog just isn’t cutting it! We wrote a post last week on the Top 5 Blogger Template sites to help you out.

Posted 3/25/08 - Kellex

You should have joined MyBlogLog by now after all the coverage we’ve given it! Today’s tip is about building your network. Yesterday we gave you the tip to go out and find 10 new blogs, comment on them and leave a trackback for the author to follow. Well today is not all that much different, but we want you to do it through MyBlogLog.

This works in completely different way and allows even less thought than yesterday’s tip. You should log into your account and go straight to the ‘Communities’ page. From here, you’ll notice the ‘Hot’ communities section listing not only new communities but also the communities that seem to be growing. At this point you simply need to start joining any that you can. MyBlogLog will limit you to 15 per day and you should set this limit as one of your goals to reach each day for the next week.

Are you starting to wonder why we are doing this? First of all, joining communities allows you to find some great material and become more active in the blogger community. However, the most important part is that your MyBlogLog or Yahoo profile picture is everywhere. By viewing or joining these communities your face pops up and gives you instant exposure! If you actually take the time to go all the way to the community’s website, your face will now appear on the MyBlogLog widget on their site as well. Now your face is in at least two places for the price of one community join. Pretty good deal ‘eh?

Now that you’ve taken the time to join communities, you are strengthening the chance of people wanting to join your community. If MyBlogLog allows you to entertain a community and users actually start to join it, you know you are well on your way to a successful blog.

Posted 3/24/08 - Kellex

Seeing steady traffic and still not satisfied? Maybe you are forgetting to promote, promote, and promote. Your current audience may be satisfied with what you are doing but that doesn't mean they are continuing to refer new readers to your site.

Your tip of the day is to find 10 new blogs within your niche, read a current post of their's and comment on it. I'm not saying write "great blog!" while leaving your name and link! Make sure to respond with something insightful that would make the blog owner want to check out your blog in return.

The best traffic building happens when you comment and the blog owner responds via comment. Not only has he/she decided you have said something useful but they have also just told the rest of their readers the same thing.

This tip could easily be performed in 20 minutes.