Volume 1 Issue 49 3-16-07

For those who would like to read this in HTML format, this issue of Boomer eZine is posted on the Boomer eZine website at http://www.boomer-ezine.com/V1I49_031607.htm and on the Boomer eZine Blog at http://boomer-ezine.blogspot.com.

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Table of Contents for this issue.....

1. Authors Comments
2. Q & A, Suggestions and Comments
3. Jim Cockrum’s New Membership Website
4. Switch from Adsense Ads to Clickbank Ads
5. Seven Dollar Offers Website ($7offers)
6. Color Detector 1.01 (Video)
7. Tucows.com

Author's Comments

The majority of this issue is all interrelated since it deals with our changing our advertising program on Boomer eZine from Google Adsense to ClickBank ads.

The Adsense ads presented on the eZine seemed too general and did not properly match the topics of the page. ClickBank has great digital products which focus on the topics that are covered by Boomer eZine.

Also, the ClickBank ads have a better commission structure than the Adsense ads. There is a joke on the Internet that Adsense ads should be called “Ad cents” ads since the commissions are relatively low (in the range of five percent (5%)). In comparison, ClickBank products are usually digital goods whose commissions are somewhat higher.

Q & A, Suggestions and Comments

We had several emails this week about various topics, but the one that we thought was a subject about which many readers might need help was how to unzip a .zip file.

Excerpted from the email

…. I down loaded the off-line sales kit, have now got it on my desk top, however when I click on it, a box comes up and asks me if I sure I want to run this file, I say yes. I click the unzip button and it says it is running 29 files and back we go again! Again if this is an easy one, fine. If not no worries I can get answers here, it will just take a few days, I am a bit like a dog with a bone!!!!!!!!!!!

My Answer

It sounds like it unzipped it and put it somewhere. All you have to do is to find where it put the unzipped files. If you are running XP, right click on the zipped file. You will be given some options. One of those is “Extract to folder”. Click that and it will ask you the folder where you want the unzipped files placed. Tell it and click Extract and the files will be unzipped into the folder you designated. Extract is a fancy verb for unzip.

If you have anything for this section or you have a suggestion for a topic for an article, please go to http://www.boomer-ezine.com/Suggestion_Form1.htm and give us your input. With your input, we can improve the Boomer Video eZine.

Jim Cockrum’s New Membership Website

An extremely exciting event happens on March 20 at 11:00 AM EST.

My friend and mentor, Jim Cockrum, the author of the all time best selling ebook “The Silent Sales Machine Hiding on eBay” is launching his membership website.

Jim has published a popular newsletter for years. The circulation of which is well over 100,000 subscribers. That is a LOT of readers.

Jim has made a career helping people get started and succeed on eBay. Many of his subscribers have wanted more information and more direct help with their eBay problems. They have encouraged him to start a membership site. Well, it is coming next week.

One of the most exciting things for us is that Jim has asked John to be one of the experts on his new site. We are honored that Jim (he is a charter subscriber to Boomer eZine) values the articles that we publish well enough to include John as one of his panel of experts. When you see the list of experts that Jim has enlisted for his site, you will appreciate why we feel honored.

If you are involved with eBay or you are considering eBay for your Internet career, this website is a must for you. I know that in past issues, I have recommended some of Jim’s books. I have recommended that at the very least, you sign up for his newsletter.

Well, now here is a website where you can get closer to the man and really tap into his genius as well as the knowledge of many other experts.

I encourage you to go to Jim’s site and look it over to see if it is for you.

You can get to Jim’s site by following this link. Jim has asked us to not activate the link until Tuesday, March 20 at 11:00 AM EST and we honor that request.

Link to Jim Cockrum’s new members only site

Switch from Adsense Ads to Clickbank Ads

We have not been pleased with the Adsense ads that appear on the top of each of the Boomer eZine issues on the Boomer eZine website. The ads seem to not be properly targeted to items that will really help our readers.

In looking around at various options, I found a software package called “ClickBank AdBox Professional” that will put ClickBank ads on your page in basically the same format as the Adsense ads.

I purchased it from $7offers.com (See next article for more details) and installed it.

It does require some computer skills to install but it has some amazingly good, detailed instructions with it.

We installed it in Volume 1 Issue 48 and it has worked well since its launch last week. We have been pleased with the content of the ads that are now appearing on the Boomer eZine site.

Seven Dollar Offers Website ($7offers)

I found this helpful site by Jonathan Leger. Granted, it is a sales site where all items cost $7.00USD. It reminds me of the offline world “Dollar Stores”. However, the items that I have purchased are quality items.

The link to the $7Offers website is

http://tinyurl.com/2vlnbw

We purchased ClickBank AdBox Professional from this site. This software places ClickBank ads on your website. You will notice that the ads starting with V1, I48 3-2-07 are different from previous issues. The ads are now ClickBank ads rather than Adsense ads.

As stated previously, we feel that ClickBank ads are much more closely targeted to the readership of Boomer eZine than the Adsense ads from Google. Plus the commission schedule is better.

ClickBank AdBox Professional for adding ClickBank ads to your site can be found at

http://tinyurl.com/2xvmcl

We also purchased a good article “1,000 Visitors in 24 Hours” for $7.00. This article was written by Jon Leger and explains how to use video (YouTube, etc.) to attract traffic to your website.

“1,000 Visitors in 24 Hours” can be found at

http://tinyurl.com/yr6ocz

I have been impressed with the value of the items that we have purchased from this site. In my opinion, the ClickBank AdBox Professional package is an especially good value.

Color Detector 1.01 (Video)

On the Boomer eZine site we use a light gray, textured background. On previous issues before V1I48, you noticed that the background of the Adsense ads at the top of the page was white. I did not think that this looked good against the light gray page background, but I did not take action to fix it.

With the installation of the ClickBank ads, I decided to make the background a closer match to the page background. I tried several free programs that let you experiment with mixing colors, but none of them were a close enough match.

I then thought “Hey, I’ll bet someone must have written a program to tell you the color codes for a color on a page”. Sure enough! When I checked on Google, I found a few programs. Some were for sale and some were freeware.

Since I am going to use this program once in the proverbial blue moon, I wanted a free color finder. I went to Tucows.com (freeware site that you need to know about) and searched on “color finder”. I chose a program from Cosmin Software. It was very easy to download and works like a charm.

When you have the page on the screen that you want to learn the code for a particular color, start up Color Detector. It opens a window on top of the target screen. As you run the cursor over the screen, a window on the Color Finder screen will show you the color codes and the name of the color (if it is named).

I opened the program and ran the cursor over the background of the Boomer-eZine page. Guess what? The color codes vary from #F0F0F0 to #FBFBFB. I had to pick one color so I settled on #F5F5F5 (called white smoke). I entered that number into the ClickBank AdBox Professional template and it matches very well.

I am quite pleased with the match. I am even more pleased with the price that I paid for the help (zero).

I have posted a short video showing the operation of Color Finder. It is easy to install and very easy to use. If you need to determine a color on a page so you can match it, this is the way to do it.

Link to video about Color Detector program (7 minutes)

Link to download Color Detector

http://www.cosmin.com/colordetector/

Tucows.com

Since we mentioned Tucows.com in the previous article, let’s talk more about it. This website is a resource that you really need to know about.

Here is what Wikipedia says about Tucows:

Tucows (originally an acronym for The Ultimate Collection of Winsock Software that has long since been dropped) was formed in Flint, Michigan, USA in 1993. It is now based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The company is perhaps most well known for its popular website directory of shareware, freeware, and demo software packages available to download. A system of mirror sites are maintained to allow the traffic to the site to be distributed among several world wide server locations. Despite the name, Tucows contains software for many major computer platforms including Linux and Macintosh, and also older versions of Windows (most notably the Windows 3.x series).

The Tucows logo is two cows staring at each other. Additionally, their ratings system uses cow icons.

End of Wikipedia quote

If you need software to do some job, try Tucows and see if someone has invented it. If you are in luck, it will be freeware. What can be a better deal?

The link to Tucows.com is http://www.tucows.com

That wraps up our issue for this week. Until next week, stay tuned.

John and Linda Howe
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