Does having a large mortgage, or even worse multiple mortgages worry you? I certainly get a bit jittery at times. As interest rates fluctuate, I tend to get a little nervous and start checking my mortgage balance quite regularly!
It's a silly, nervous habit really. I have two mortgages, both of them investment based mortgages and of those, one is a Fixed Rate Mortgage. The other home loan thats currently at a variable rate only has a small balance owing and the rental returns are quite healthy - certainly positively geared.
So why do I worry?
I probably can't answer that simply. As new reports come in from around the globe and the pressure continues on mortgage rates - I suppose it's only natural to worry. I tend to get anxious after the evening news discusses defaults on mortgages and predicts doom and gloom. Even though there is no benefit, I simply continue to check the balance and bite my nails as I look at whats owning in total.
Having a mortgage thats fixed does take a lot of the worry away from your investment. Sure, if rates go down quite quickly you might find yourself paying slightly more - but for the benefit of piece of mind and the ability to budget so precisely; having a fixed product makes so much sense.
So while I have my moments of worry, I know I have a solid product and overall, my investment returns are quite healthy specifically in the mid to long term.
The current mortgage market
Benefits of Justin.TV
My old mate Ed Dale has now started broadcasting on Justin.TV and I had the pleasure of tuning in today to see what all the fuss was about.
I had heard bits and pieces about Justin.TV but had never really taken the time to check it out or utilize it as a marketing or promotional tool.
After sitting through Ed's - 30 Day Challenge presentation (live streaming) today, I was quite impressed. The Justin.TV interface is solid, allowing users to feedback constantly on the stream and the buffering and delivery was fine, considering there were several thousand views on at once.
Certainly a great medium and one that should 'take the next step, on from YouTube'. At present we all know video is huge. YouTube has taken video to the masses, but Justin.TV can literally turn any home into a 'live' video broadcasting studio. Ultimately a home tv studio.
I'll be looking into it further as a tool for my major sports website over at NRL Results and the potential to sportscast the NRL and Rugby League over there will be a massive opportunity.
Thanks for getting our feet wet Ed, content started a little flakey, but came good at the end. Hopefully you can go into more detail about the blogs that are more suited to SEO purposes and how to successfully insert backlinks for SERP promotion.
Small Business Loan?
As my projects online tend to get bigger and bigger, I regularly need to look for smart financing options. The online arena has opened up the finance market substantially, with many players able to offer finance unsecured to clients around the world. It's fiercely competitive and it ensures that as clients; we all get the best service and access to the best loans in a much simpler fashion than previously possible.
One such outlet I like to deal with is EzUnsecured.Com - these guys really make getting a Small Business Loan online quick, simply and totally painfree. After using them initially and finding the service to be excellent - I had no hesitation in using them for my next venture. My latest website required quick a large start-up investment and without having access to fast unsecured finance, it would have taken me much longer to build the online business and delay the time it took to start generating profit.
So if you're short on time and don't have too much collateral to work with; these are the guys that can help. They also do credit cards and lines of credit, so every angle is covered. Take the leap today and with their help, you can send your small business into orbit with a strong financial partner in EzUnsecured.Com
How to do Online Video easily
As the popularity of online video continues to grow, many leading and even basic personal websites and blogs are trying to get a piece of the video action. All the statistics show that video growth is happening almost daily and the time that internet users spend on video, already far outweights that of traditional text and still image viewing.
As the monetization opportunities grow with video, it's smart to start building your video content now. Several companies are already building 'video and image' based search engine technology so the worlds database of video can be catalogued without the need for description.
Getting started is easy and I found this 'how to do online video easy' tutorial by one of my favourite marketers Joel Comm a perfect explanation for getting video into your site. The important point being here, try and have a camera with you at all times - you never know when good content might pop up right in front of you.
Yahoo and GoDaddy Domains lead the list
I mentioned a few posts back, that I have managed to get a list of the highest paying keywords that on average generate higher returns in their niches. While there are a few unusual ones, the chart topping titles of 'Domain Yahoo', 'Domains Yahoo' and 'Yahoo Web Hosting' are all not surprising in the heated market of domain registration and the cut through web hosting business.
Also high on the list are the advertising keywords from the law and order niches. Illinois Law, Law Wisconsin and Law Ohio all remain high on the list of the highest paying keywords and coming soon after these law keywords are the finance and mortgage industry.
The mortgage and finance keywords didn't surprise me, as you see a stack of affiliate sites all built around mortgage and money lending. I have seen quite a few Smorty and PayPerPost requests from this niche in particular. Examples: 100 Home Equity Loan, UK Homeowner Loans, Adverse Credit Remortgage.
The other high rating area was that of Google Adsense and Google Affiliate, both returning handsome sums to their owners.
The final two areas on the list revolved around hair removal, laser hair removal and other medical specialist terms. And the last few keyterms were around the cellular industry, ATT, AT&T and AT&T Wireless.
Did you pick any of these?
If you have any other high paying keywords you'd like to add, feel free to comment to this post.
The Rubicon Project Reviewed
As many of you guys know, I started running the Rubicon Project here on the 30 Day Man to maximize the advertising networks available to me and basically make things easier rather than having to manage multiple networks, heaps of html code and rotating banners.
The Rubicon Project simply makes sense. No wonder it has won awards and looks to be the next big thing. Taking heaps of Ad Networks and doing the ground work for publishers is very smart.
However after a month or more of usage, I haven't seen the major results I was hoping for. Initially I was only running Rubicon here on the 30 Day Man - but after finding the interface easy to use and seeing the potential I rolled it out to my major sports and football blog at NRL Results and sadly the Rubicon Project failed to deliver.
Heres the scenario, prior to installing the Rubicon code - I was running vanilla AdSense on the website. Impressions were between 5000-6000 per day and my earnings were at least $20 USD or more each day.
After switching the AdSense for Rubicon, I saw a similar amount of impressions net me around $1-$2 a day. In a haste I quickly pulled the pin on the Rubicon code and went back to AdSense.
My first thoughts were; "Maybe the ad networks being used don't have the right content match for my sports site, which is Australian based and maybe suffering from USA only syndrome."
However, after a closer look - the Rubicon stats were broken down as follows: 4,350 impressions of Google AdSense for clicks totalling; 5 (CTR of 0.12) and earnings of $1.18. So how can the drop be so huge if they are using AdSense anyway? Pretty scary if you ask me.
1584 impressions went to Active Response Group for a total of 5 clicks also, and finally 851 went to CPX interactive for clicks of 1.
Pretty miserable stats. So the idea of Rubicon is great and I do hope more players come on board to advertise with them. I have been keen to speak to someone at Rubicon to get this all explained and hopefully that can happen. However, for now - I will keep Rubicon running here at the 30 Day Man as the content matching seems better and while the results haven't been awesome - they haven't been worse than previous testing with AdSense and other networks such as John Chows and the like.
Looking for a rapist
I heard a pretty scary story the other day and from what I am told it's true. A good friend of mine said he knew of a girl of around 27 years old that was finding it hard to meet a partner and remained a virgin.
He said that the girl was placing so much pressure on herself 'to have sex' that she was getting into dangerous territory. Her mind and thoughts, always focused on meeting 'any' guy and scoring. Frequenting night spots and putting herself out there in scary ways, she rarely if ever was able to meet a guy and felt her average looks and large frame would prevent her from every getting up close and personal with a guy.
Anyway, this next part gets real scary. Apparently in her home town, there was a period when a rapist was on the loose and authorities were on the lookout for the suspect - who was known to lurk outside clubs and public transport spots in the small hours of the morning.
It turns out, that once the girl heard of the rapist at large - she went 'looking' for this so-called rapist in the hope she could be 'victimised' and finally lose her virginity. I was dumbfounded when I heard this story and it still amazes me that a girl in such a position was somehow feeling so inadequate that she went in search of a monster like this. Standing at bus shelters and waiting on the streets until the early hours in the hope she could be abducted!
Fortunately friends told family and authorities of the girls attempts and she was quickly picked-up safely and held for medical examination.
Man you think things are tough in your own life until you hear stories like this that blow you away. I am still struggling to believe such a situation could arise!
