That actually wasn’t my first choice for a title, but it’ll do better in the search engines, so I’ll give that a whirl.

Anyway, you may recall my little weekend experiment. The experiment was to make $100 by 11:59 p.m. on May 31, 2010.

First, some background…

BACKGROUND

I wanted to purchase an online product that cost $20 PayPal. However, I made a deal with myself that I would only buy it if I could earn the money over the weekend. So, it was a nice challenge for myself.

However, going all out to try to earn twenty bucks online seemed, well, kind of lame. Plus, it’s not terribly interesting. So, I thought it would make for a good experiment to up the ante. If you hang out in any of the Internet marketing forums online, there are always people coming in wanting to make money fast. I thought a goal of $100 was more realistic while also a big enough payoff to make an effort worthwhile.

If I accomplished it, it would prove that it could be done. If I came in under a hundred, I’d still accomplish my personal goal of earning that twenty bucks. Unless, of course, I came in at under twenty or nothing at all. But, you have to think positive. In any event, I’d get a blog post out of it. And, if I were smart, I would have packaged this up as a “special report” and sold it.

So, be happy me stoopid cause you is getting some frees infurmayshun here.

Anyway, so that’s what set the stage for a weekend experiment in making $100 online, payable through PayPal so the money is actually accessible.

WHAT TO DO TO EARN THE MONEY

As said, the goal was to have the money in hand (er, in account) at the deadline. That meant things like Google AdSense and many CPA programs and affiliate programs would be out because you might earn the money, but you wouldn’t actually have it in hand until they write their checks or issue electronic deposits, and so on. There are some that pay instantly through PayPal, but sometimes affiliate programs are a crapshoot. You could get an immediate payoff, but not always. Personally, affiliate income I’ve made has been over time and not instant. Normally, if you build a campaign and get a sale within a few days, that’s not too bad. But, when the goal is faster than that, especially on a holiday weekend, a few days is too long.

Likewise, selling something on eBay or any other online site like that probably wouldn’t work well. You could do a short auction, but you may not get as much as you would ordinarily. If you were in a pinch, it could be done. Otherwise, you’re better off doing it where you can maximize your profit on whatever you choose to sell.

What that leaves you with is offering a service that can be performed or delivered online. If you’re using a computer to get online, you probably have some skill you can offer as a service. Forum commenting, writing articles, building websites, creating graphics, etc. are all possibilities.

I offered article writing, editing and graphics as possibilities. Ordinarily, you might put up a set price for services, but I went with a name your own price option, hoping that would attract more buyers.

GETTING THE WORD OUT

Here’s where some people would have a problem. I used both my blog and Twitter to get the word out about my offer. So, I had pre-existing assets I could utilize. The work I did end up doing came via Twitter and not the blog.

Not everyone who needs fast cash is going to have assets like that. However, you could set up a blog on Blogger (free) and then set up a Twitter account (free) and then spread the word. Just do not spam, because that’ll get you taken out of either one of those. Even still, it may be an uphill battle for most people here. And that’s why it’s important that you build your online assets (blog, social networking friends/followers, lists, etc.) before you need them. For example, there are people with big lists where all they have to do is offer something like a Memorial Day special over the weekend and, boom!, they’ve got sales.

So, this is the tough point. Maybe some other weekend I’ll try a similar experiment but without using any existing assets.

THE RESULTS

I did it. I made $100 in under 31 hours from the time I posted to the time I got paid. (And I got a regular night’s sleep in between). From the time of first contact with the client to getting paid, it was about 23 and a half hours. Thus, technically, I made $100 in under a day.

On Twitter, I have a ton of marketers following me. A ton. I expected at least some of them would respond to the article writing service. My expectation was that I would get 4-5 people offering $20-$25 for article writing and that’d be how I’d earn the $100.

Instead, I had only one person contact me. For the purposes of the experiment, that was disappointing. As mentioned, I expected at least 4 or 5 people. But, personally, it was great because I only had to work with one person, so I didn’t have to try to juggle 4-5 clients with multiple projects over a very short period of time.

I did what was essentially article writing and was paid $100 for all the work I did. Hopefully, the client feels they got their money’s worth, because I feel like I earned it. I know some people can bang out articles like there’s no tomorrow, but I spent time on these. I’m not going to give to someone else something I wouldn’t put on my own website. And by my own website, I mean the websites I own other than this blog, because the bar on this blog is so low it’s practically rolling across the floor and you have to be careful not to trip over it.

The bottom line is that I did what I set out to do, which was to make $100 over the weekend. And, that actually turned out to be $100 in under 31 hours from posting the offer to money in my PayPal account. So, the proof of concept is there. It is possible. It can be done.

And it was fun. Maybe I’ll try to repeat it on some other weekends too with some variations on technique.

I’m calling this post the “Super Sunday Mystery Post” because I have no idea what it’s going to be about. I’m just going to write whatever comes to mind, so we’ll see where this goes. You may end up bored silly or you might end up mildly amused. You read this post, you takes yer chances.

First up, yesterday’s offer is still open. I’m actually taking a break from a project right now to write this post, but if you need anything, jump in now while the water is still hot. Because, once I hit $100 or Monday’s done, whichever comes first, the deal is done.

Second, thanks to all you readers for making May the best month ever (at least so long as I have stats) in terms of traffic. Yeah, two days left to go in the month, and May is already the best month ever. But I repeat myself. But, if you hire me to write an article or something, I won’t repeat myself like that. Probably. I writes better fer cash. Just sayin’.

I’ve taken more pictures lately, but you can’t see them because I can’t post them so never mind.

Oh, sure. I hear you. I could set up a Flickr account or something. As if I don’t already have enough passwords to keep track of…

I’ve got to get back to work so, to sum things up, thanks, me writes betters fer cash, never mind pictures.

I am doing a little marketing experiment this weekend.

My goal is to earn $100 via PayPal before 11:59 p.m. Monday, May 31st. Preferably, I’d like to finish early, like Sunday night.

That eliminates most affiliate marketing programs because they typically don’t pay instantly. Some do, but I’m thinking offering a service is going to be the most effective use of my time.

So, I am offering some of my services…

ARTICLE WRITING
I haven’t done any article writing for clients in a while, so I don’t have a set rate for it. This weekend’s special is going to be name your price, but the offer needs to be more than my editing rates because, I mean, come on…

EDITING
Perhaps you’ve written a solid report or eBook, but your writing skills are not up to par. I can assist you in polishing your written material.

Proofreading: $5.00 per 1000 words
Proofreading includes checking for typos, misspellings and other minor errors. This is a good option if your English skills are strong and you primarily need a second set of eyes to check your work.

Copyediting: $7.50 per 1000 words
Copyediting includes checking for typos, misspellings, grammatical errors and punctuation. It also includes any rewriting necessary for clarity or consistency. This is a good option if you’re not an experienced writer or your English skills are not strong.

GRAPHICS
This will depend upon what you want done. I’ve done Twitter backgrounds for $100, so if you want one of those, that would be awesome. Otherwise, I can do banner ads, simple logos, headers, starbursts, dancing monkeys, etc. I’ve done logo clean-up, converted bitmap/JPEG logos to vector. Need a 125×125 ad for your blog? I can do that. Again, this weekend’s fee is going to be name your price, but be reasonable.

If you want me to do something, eMail me at “hire dcr” (but no spaces or quotes) and that’ll be at (as in @) this blog address, that is dcrblogs.com. That’s dcrblogs.com with hiredcr and the little AT symbol in front of it. Got it?

I reserve the right to reject any offers that are just too low. I’m not going to write you ten articles for a buck or do 100 graphics for $1. It’s just not going to happen. So, contact me first and we’ll discuss and I’ll give you a yay or nay on your name your price offer.

Here’s the thing, though. This offer is only good until I’ve made $100 or 11:59 p.m. Monday, May 31, 2010. After that, it’s done. So you must ACT NOW!

For those of us who have desired to blog with a purpose (and that purpose often being profit), one of the things many of us have done is to listen to the supposed gurus.

That’s all fine and well and really is good advice if you’re new to blogging and don’t know where to start. Better to start on a path that showed promise for someone else rather than risk venturing out there and falling off an unexpected cliff. That’s not to say that you cannot find riches blazing your own trail, but it’s unlikely that you would stumble upon an oasis if you’re not an experienced hiker. You’ve got to have the basics down before you can set out on your own path. Learning from others is an advisable way to learn those basics. Otherwise, you might die from a poisonous berry.

However, you cannot be content with simply emulating what others have done. What may have worked for someone else may not work for you. This will be especially true if your market and audience are completely different from that of your selected guru.

That’s why you need to test and try new things.

Case in point, the use of photos. It’s long been advised that putting photos on your blog attracts readers. It makes for a more pleasant appearance and engages the reader, we’re told. For a long time, I’ve been sticking photos in almost every post, generally at the top of the post which was also the advice offered by some of the blogging gurus. As mentioned previously, since mid-April I have not been able to post new photos on this blog. So, traffic should decrease, right? I should be losing readers, no?

About a week later, I mentioned that traffic had actually increased. Coincidence? Maybe. But, on the other hand, I’ve not made any other changes to this blog. I’ve not advertised it more. I’ve not been commenting on other blogs more. The only change I’ve made (albeit unwillingly) was to not post new photos. Mind you, I’ve sporadically recycled old photos from the blog’s archives, but those have been very few. Overall, most posts have been strictly textual in nature.

But, how has that trend been holding up in the several weeks since then?

Well, traffic has continued to increase. In fact, in terms of traffic, May (so far) has beaten every single month of last year in terms of traffic, even the best months. Also, it’s beaten every month of 2008 (for which I still have stats available to check). And May is usually a down month compared to other months. It’s also beaten every month of this year so far, except for March. But, unless traffic shrivels up by a staggering percentage over the weekend, May should best March too.

Could this all be coincidence? I can’t rule it out but I also cannot account for anything else that might affect the traffic. Maybe people got tired of looking at silly pictures (even though the dancing monkeys were quite popular)? I don’t know. It’s just that the only difference I can identify that corresponds with the increase in traffic is the point at which I stopped posting new pictures.

The point here is not that you should not use photos, but that you shouldn’t take my word for it, nor the word of any blogging expert that says you should use photos. Test things out for yourself and see which method performs best for your blog.

Ever felt like you’ve almost completely lost your mind?

That is, you feel mentally disorganized, not knowing what to tackle next?

Sometimes, it can be so crippling that, instead of doing something, you end up watching TV because you cannot decide what to do. So, you just take the path of least resistance by grabbing a pop and bag of chips and plopping yourself on the sofa.

If that’s you, maybe it’s time you do something about it…

Maybe it’s time to learn how to train your mind.

Your mind is like any other organ and it can be exercised and trained to do what you need it to do. Need to break a bad habit? Need to end procrastination? Need to get things done? Those are all things that an “unfit” mind may be holding you back from. But, it’s never too late to exercise your “mental muscle” and to get it into shape.

You can start with a helpful guide, How to Train Your Mind.

With it, you can whip your mind into shape. You can learn to get past your own obstacles and accomplish the things you need, the things you want, to get done.

So, do yourself a favor and check out How to Train Your Mind today!

Summer is coming soon so that means it’s time for reruns.

Usually that just means TV repeats, but it appears to be spreading to the blogosphere as well.

Holy cow! Hollywood’s creative bankruptcy is contagious!!! Run for your creative lives!

Anyway, Speedy did it, JD did it and I did it. Reruns, that is. Don’t know what you were thinking and I probably don’t want to know.

And, by golly, I’m gonna do it again.

Let’s take a trip back in time and see what I posted on this day last year. I have no idea because I haven’t checked yet. Okay, jumping into the archives now…

Cool. That was in the middle of “Tweet Week” and that post was on “Security“.

That’s still some useful information, so you should check it out (again?): “Tweet Week: Security“.

In fact, that whole series was pretty good (if I do say so myself, and I just did), so here’s the whole series list:

1. Tweet Week: Twitter Following
2. Tweet Week: Frequency of Tweets
3. Tweet Week: Gone Phishing
4. Tweet Week: Security
5. Tweet Week: Avoiding the Empty Nest Syndrome
6. Tweet Week: Fail
7. Tweet Week: Maintaining Your Flock

You see, sometimes repeats aren’t bad.

It’s the endless remakes that get annoying.

For whatever strange reason, I’ve been getting good traffic for the month of May. The month isn’t over yet, and traffic has already trounced last May’s traffic levels.

In fact, if the traffic holds steady, this May will beat out every other month of this year so far, which is strange because, at least comparing this year to last, May is a down month for traffic.

Of course, with Memorial Day weekend coming up, I am expecting traffic to be down on those three days, so the odds are good I won’t end up beating every other month of this year so far.

Unless, of course, I come up with some really stunning and amazing post before Friday.

But what are the odds of that? Slim to none, I think.

Plus, what do most people come here looking for? Well, let’s take a look:

• naked woman
• naked women
• vintage school single chalk holder or pencil
• antiques blogs
• nude guy
• creepy
• elgin starburst clock
• dcr
• women naked
• blog babe kitchen apron nude
• women swimsuit models
• underwear blog
• underwear nude
• naked seven of nine
• normal naked women
• men wearing women’s swimwear photos
• turn a woman on
• waffle ball
• nude women hot

And that list means a lot of people come here and leave disappointed.

Probably bitterly disappointed.

Maybe that’s how I end up on so many spam lists?

Who knows?

You may remember this post from April 7th of this year: “Is There Anything that People Won’t Complain About?”

Since that is exactly how I am feeling right now, I am going to repeat it.

You know, for effect.

And because I was going to write something else, but the more I thought about it, the more I felt like this older post and why rehash it when I can just copy and paste it? Like this…

Seriously. Anything? Especially online?

I’ve seen comments lately (and long before lately too) from people that complain about things that really don’t have the slightest bit of anything to do with them. I’m not talking about any place specifically; I’m talking about a number of sites I visit online.

It’s like if I painted a room in my house green. It’s one thing to say that you prefer blue or that you would have painted it white with green accents. There’s no real issue if you want to express your opinion.

It’s if you want to complain, and bitterly complain, that I painted a room green because you think I should have painted it ochre. Or to complain that I painted the room at all because I should get new carpeting. Or whatever.

Especially if you’ve never been to my house, you haven’t loaned me money for the paint or paint brush and you’ve really had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with my house, my room or my painting of the room green.

It’s like there are people that live to complain about things.

The real problem is that this sort of attitude permeates our society. And the complainers are often the loudest voices while they are also often the most irrational. And then, if you complain about the complainers, you’re labeled no better than them.

Except the difference is that while their gripe was illegitimate because what you did had nothing to do with them, your gripe is perfectly legitimate because their complaining may be hurting you. But, now you’re the bad guy.

And that’s because the chronic complainers get the attention. They’ll write letters. They’ll annoy people. Then there will be people that will step up and lend legitimacy to the complainers by arguing that, though some of them may be extreme, it’s perfectly reasonable to argue that painting a room in ochre is a better choice than green because it brightens the place up better.

And that makes people happier, which makes them more productive, which makes things better for society.

And, studies released by the paint companies that sell ochre paint confirm those findings.

And then the politicians decide that no one should paint their rooms green and that they should be painted ochre.

And then soon all of us are painting our rooms ochre because of a few complainers that had nothing better to do than to complain about something that didn’t affect them at all to begin with.

Well, that was an easy post. And I feel better now. Sort of. Had too much to eat for supper, so I’m still feeling kind of stuffed. Went to Five Guys Burgers and Fries. Got a “regular” order of cajun fries. Which looked like a small order of fries. Which turned out to be a rather large looking cup of fries which was overfilled, and overflowing into a larger brown bag. So, there was a lot of fries. A lot of fries. And, you know, I can’t waste food. I had to eat the fries. I had to bring the brown bag home and finish the fries. There were a lot of fries. Did I mention the fries?

Yes, I did have fries with that.

Am I complaining? Um, no. Just saying it was a lot of fries.

A lot of fries.

It bears repeating.

A lot of fries.

Until next time,
Believe. Act. Eat Fries!

One of the most popular posts on my blog this month is “Have You Ever Seen Anything So Strange?” from back in June of last year.

Go on and take a look if you don’t remember. I’ll wait as you add another hit to its popularity counter…

Anyway, not sure what makes it so popular.

Is it the two-headed groundhog?

Or, is it the blue banana?

People search for the strangest things.

And I supply some of them.

Not sure who would be searching for a groundhog, er two-headed groundhog, in May. Groundhog’s Day is in February and six more weeks of winter or until spring would have ended in March.

Or maybe it’s the blue banana that is so popular? Who looks for blue bananas? Do you? Would you give a “woo!” if you saw a banana that was blue? Or would it cause your head to grow in two, like the groundhog grew?

Who knew?

Okay, tonight is the series finale for LOST, and ABC has made a big production out of it. It’s basically a night of LOST.

Kind of a bummer they’re slipping in the local news between the LOST finale and the Jimmy Kimmel special. Bummer too that they’ve got Jimmy Kimmel instead of Jay Leno, but I’ll just mentally tune Jimmy Kimmel out and just listen to the LOST cast and crew.

Guess it’ll be good for the ratings of local news stations because most people aren’t going to switch the channel to their favorite local news because, in a lot of places, there’s so little difference it’s not worth the effort.

Anyway, so don’t expect to see me online during the next six hours or so. I used to have a computer in the same room as the TV so I could watch TV and be online at the same time, but I haven’t had that setup in ages. And when I bring my laptop into the room, I just end up focusing on either the TV or the computer, so it’s somewhat of a moot point. In any case, I don’t have an Internet hookup in the TV room, so it’s a doubly moot point.

Maybe I’ll be online after the LOST marathon is done. Not sure.