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                Make Easy Money with Google and AdSense

                    Volume 1, Issue 9 -- November 1, 2006

                       Copyright 2006 by Eric Giguere
                         mailto:eric@memwg.com
                      www.memwg.com/blog/adsense/

        Feel free to forward this newsletter by email, but
        for all other uses please refer to the instructions
                  at the end of this newsletter.
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A very interesting topic today: Google Custom Search Engines
and how to make money from them. But first, some more about
a product I recommended last time...

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PART 1: Reader Comments About Affiliate "Project X"

I've had a few readers buy Affiliate "Project X" (APX for short)
using my referral link (for which I thank you) and have already
received some feedback from them on whether or not it was a good
purchase, and I'd like to share that feedback with you. I realize
that APX is not a cheap e-book at $97, but it's enough of an
interesting and thought-provoking read that I felt it was worthy
of my recommendation. And you know that my recommendations mean
something. Still, if you're sitting on the fence, maybe these
comments will mean something from you.

=> Get APX here: GetProjectAffiliateX.com

The first comment is from Jeremy Curtis, who gave me permission
to reveal his name and to mention his site -- so please feel
free to visit http://www.childrenwebmag.com/ as a thank you.
This is what Jeremy told me: "Have read the ebook once, it is
good in that it is not fluff and as you say clearly involves
some hard work (not so good!)."

That's one of the things I like about APX, because it doesn't
claim you can make money selling ClickBank products without
doing any work. And it's not that it's hard work, mostly that it
takes time and practice to get the promotions going.

Another reader, Paul -- I don't have permission to use his full
name -- had a bit more to say:

"After spending a few hours with the affiliatex pdf last night
I will agree it was worth the money :)"

He continues:

"I didn't know about the clickbank side of the world and seeing
what is there has been an eyeopener. I see a few things I can
promote on my own sites and it provides lots of ideas for content
I could produce myself and sell via clickbank."

That's great, I'm happy that Paul's been able to get so much out
of the book. He had some further comments about APX, though,
wondering why Chris (the author) didn't talk about promoting
affiliate products via high-ranking web pages. My take on it is
that most people don't have those kinds of pages and that it
takes a long time to get a high PageRank. Look at my own blog --
it's only been in the last month, after more than a solid year
of blogging, that my AdSense blog has reached PR6. Mind you, some
of that was my own fault in that I had to move the site to a
different domain because of trademark issues. That caused my PR
to dive for a long time. I have other sites at similar PR levels,
but it's definitely not a quick strategy, and most of the APX
methods aim at getting a profitable promotion running quickly.

=> Get APX here: GetProjectAffiliateX.com

Paul also bought another product I recommend recently called
"Build A Niche Store". Its developer, Kelvin Firminger, has been
really responsive to anyone who's asked questions, even going
so far as to build demo auction sites for them. Here's what
Paul had to say about the BANS product:

"I have this large collection of niche sites on which I have
placeholder content. Many have good PR and some traffic already.
I would like to tightly couple my content with the auctions I
select. That of course means I need to exercise the more complex
parts of the script."

And that's the great thing about this product -- it's extremely
flexible and easily customizable. Seriously, if you'd like to
put eBay listings on your sites, give Build A Niche Store a look:

=> Get BANS: BuildNicheStores.com

If you buy either of these products from me, I have bonuses to
give you, so drop me a line. Be sure to clear your ClickBank
cookies before you buy, though :-)

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PART 2: Google Custom Search Engines

Alright, enough with the product recommendations. Let's switch
gears and talk about Google's new Custom Search Engines product.

A Custom Search Engine (CSE for short) is effectively a clone of
the Google search engine that skews the results a certain way.
A CSE can be a regular Google search that emphasizes certain
sites -- effectively giving those sites a temporary PageRank
boost within the CSE so that their pages get priority. Or a CSE
can actually restrict the search to a list of specific sites. Or
even exclude specific sites from the search. The advanced
features are very powerful.

CSE overview

CSEs make Google money by displaying AdWords ads on the search
result pages, just as Google does with its main search engine.
What interests us most as AdSense publishers is the ability to
monetize a CSE by associating our AdSense publisher ID with those
ads -- in other words, Google is letting us share the revenue it
makes from a CSE via our AdSense accounts. Now THAT is a cool
feature. All of a sudden you have all the power of the Google
search engine behind you and the ability to make some cash from
some of those searches.

Now's the time for the early movers to get into the CSE game and
make money. There are lots of CSEs being created all the time
now, but the CSE space is still wide open. If you have a niche
that you already exploit via AdSense or affiliate marketing, you
should consider creating a CSE tailored to that market and then
promoting it to your audience.

Traffic, of course, is key here: a CSE won't make you money
unless it has traffic, just like your content sites. Getting
people to find your CSE in the first place is going to be the
biggest challenge. There are several CSE directories that have
popped up already, so you'll want to list your CSE there. And
you'll want to get your CSE in the search engine indexes as well.
But you'll have to drive some target ed traffic to the CSEs to
really get the money rolling in. Repeat business is what's going
to make or break you here, so you need to provide a quality CSE
that is useful and adds real value to your niche's audience. If
they like it, they'll start coming back. Just don't expect to
make a lot of money overnight.

The great thing about CSEs is that you don't have to be a coder
to create a great search engine. You just need to be able to
create a website, really, and it can be very simple -- just a
couple of pages to host the JavaScript code for the search box
and the search results.

So take what you know about your niche -- you should know a good
deal about it if you're creating AdSense sites for it using
whitehat techniques -- and build yourself a great CSE. Be sure
to associate it with the sites in your niche. In fact, you might
consider replacing the search boxes on your site (including the
AdSense for search ones) with search boxes for your CSE.

If you create a killer CSE monetized with AdSense, I'd love to
hear about it -- I might even publicize it and send you some
extra traffic!

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About This Newsletter
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Written by Eric Giguere, author of the book "Make Easy Money with
Google: Using the AdSense Advertising Program", this newsletter
provides you with tips and advice on using Google's AdSense
program, other advertising programs, and content monetization in
general.

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by email, I love to hear from my readers. Suggestions for topics
you'd like to see discussed are always welcome in particular!

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This newsletter is copyright 2006 by Eric Giguere, all rights
reserved. You may forward this newsletter to anyone you think
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Eric Giguere
November 1, 2006

eric@memwg.com