1. Problogger posted 12 cpm alternatives to Adsense. CPM of course means, that you are getting paid for impressions which can really add up with high traffic websites.

A couple of those companies actually have quite low requirements in terms of traffic so you can test them on a some low traffic sites you might have…

2. Matt from BloggingFingers released his first ever e-book about blog monetization strategies. Oh, and did I mention that it’s free?

Matt explains a few important topics like when to monetize your blog, what kind of monetization you can use (CPC, CPM, affiliates, …) and how to succeed in the long term.

Go grab it now before it’s too late…

3. But immediately after you download it, check what Gary Conn thinks about ebook downloads.

Here’s my answer to Gary – some ebooks are cool, most of them are not, some people figure that out quickly and most don’t. So for those people, that really don’t get it, the people who continuously release ebooks are they greatest teachers…

There is no way to convince the people who always buy ebooks, to stop doing that. THEY have to realize the futility of that through pain – losing money and not gaining anything.

4. I liked this post on Forbes about The coming death of Indian outsourcing.

The whole point is about this: the salaries and standards in India are rising and people who work for low prices – in our western standards of course – will soon stop doing that.

My girlfriend is from Thailand and I know that she can be financially free, living a normal life in Thailand with $500 per month. Average salary in Thailand for a worker (cashier, hotel room service and so on) is about $300 to $400 per month.

Of course, the food, clothes and most other stuff is ridiculously cheap too… (for us)

So if she can build a website (I did one for her ) that makes at least $500 per month, she doesn’t have to work anymore.

It’s similar in many places in Asia like that…

By the way, I came across some cool posts on other blogs but they all had a pagerank of 0. Some of those blogs rank pretty high on the top 100 money making blogs so I am not sure what’s happening. If Google is penalizing them, I’ll play it safe for now by not linking to them.

Maybe next time with nofollow…

Why USEFUL in all caps?

Well, in my humble opinion, there is so much information out there that’s just plain entertaining, link baiting with no real juice or just regurgitated articles of things written and told million times.

So here’s what I found and I recommend you read (and possibly download!):

1. Caroline Middlebrook has written an excellent ebook on How to create niche sites with a WordPress blog. I’ve read the ebook and it’s excellent.

The information is very concise and Caroline gets right to the point on how to set up your blog, how to change certain options, where to get good SEO optimized templates and so on.

Highly recommended!

2. Ryan Shamus actually has two cool articles you may want to check:

a) How to make money with Clickbank

This is a really extensive article you may want to bookmark because before you’ll actually complete all the steps that Ryan suggests a few weeks will pass by.

And yes, Clickbank works really well for my tennis products too and I get tons of affiliates promoting my products.

About 50% of my sales of from my affiliates and my total monthly income from Clickbank sales is between $1500 and $2000.

b) Free social networking sites is a collection of not only the places where you can bookmark your site but also communicate with people who share your interests.

It’s a long list and I suggest you take a few minutes to check the description of each site and see whether it’s useful to your blog niche or not.

3. Grizzly wrote an excellent post titled How to Make Money with Adsense. Grizzly’s posts are typically very long but I what I appreciate is that he puts a lot of effort into writing them and he always writes something new and interesting.

Excellent blog to subscribe to!

4. SelfMakeChick shares her secrets on How to Write SEO Press Releases. Not only that, she also offers a free ebook with all the info.

Press releases are often overlooked ways of link building and can be very effective. Check out how SelfMadeChick got 5 of top 10 Google rankings with only one press release.

5. And finally, Jonathan Leger explains Why off Theme Links Have to be Counted by Google.

I am subscribed to Jon’s newsletter and blog since he is one of the few gurus who doesn’t constantly promote his or other people’s products.

I’d say his valuable content / promotion ratio is about 90 / 10. Most other gurus have a 10 / 90 ratio and I’ve been on their list only for a few weeks or so before I unsubscribed.

In fact, here’s what you can do today to save time and your sanity: check on how many guru lists you are, check their last 10 posts and evaluate their valuable content / promotion ratio.

If it’s less than 70 / 30, unsubscribe. You’ll have much more time to do the things that matter and bring you closer to financial freedom.

1. If you plan to build a content site (which you should ), here’s how Amy suggests to set goals for them.

You’ll also learn the 5 types of content sites and how to measure your success after you monetize them.

2. Tinu writes about How to maximize traffic, money or sales in 2008 and the key is FOCUS.

You’ll also find a great example of maximizing your efficiency.

3. I came a across a great money making blog Emonetized and I recommend this post about affiliate networks if for any strange reason you don’t want to join the best affiliate program on the net.

4. Stephen points you in the right direction when you decide to make money online. His point is that you should leverage your existing skills.

I agree, follow your passion and combine that with a website and you’re on your way towards financial freedom!

5. And Suzie posts a video of Deepak Chopra and the Wonder Of you. It’s not a typical money making tip but hopefully you’ll stop for a minute and realize that there is an enormous power inside of you and if you decide to become financially free, there’s nothing that can stop you.

Maybe one day I’ll show you a simple trick I use to find these cool blogs but for now here are this week’s financial freedom online tips which will bring you a step closer to financial and personal independence:

1. Imar writes about blogger’s regret. This can happen if you write posts if you are in a hurry, emotional or in a few other situations.

There are a few very good tips on how to avoid that and what to do if you actually wrote a post you might regret.

2. Fred shares his thoughts about the Secret and law of attraction. If you haven’t seen The Secret, I strongly encourage you to do so.

3. Terry wrote an excellent article about your heart’s desires and how stuff that you buy may not make you happy.

I talked with my friend yesterday on a similar subject, when I spent 9 hours with her and her children driving around Bangkok and other places.

She felt a little uncomfortable taking so much of my time and I said that: “Friends are the most valuable thing we have. You can buy stuff with money if you have it, but stuff is dead. How can dead stuff make you happy and enjoy life in the long term?”

4. Wild Bill has something to say about Never Giving Up so take 5 minutes to check the video on that page. As I mentioned before, I strongly believe that the only way to fail in online business is to give up.

You certainly cannot say WHEN you are going to make it big, but if you stick to it, you are undoubtedly going to achieve financial freedom.

5. Jo shares my thoughts of sticking to it in a post about What’s holding you back.

See if you can find yourself in one of the five possible types of writers and what it takes for each type to overcome their main weakness.

SmallFuel Marketing give you 31 reasons why your small business will succeed.

Note – the list is quite funny and at times sarcastic but there are many hidden gems in there.

Costa explores the reasons for blogging and warns about the money part.

He is actually even more tough on the money part than me so perhaps that is something to keep in mind when you are trying to achieve financial freedom.

PabloPabla shares 8 tips on how to sustain long term blogging even when sometimes you might lose motivation to keep at it.

I agree that without passion your motivation will soon be only a shadow of what it was at the beginning.

Christian shares his experiences with distractions when blogging.

If your goal is financial freedom then you’ll need to set new priorities and pursue that goal. Don’t just blog and hope for traffic and money.

Set a goal and go for it until you reach it.

And finally Genesis interviews herself on the topic of working from home, what she learned from her mistakes, and what are her advices to everyone starting on the journey towards financial freedom.

And let me share my tips that I gave to a good friend of mine when we chatted for a while.

He asked me what are the chances of failing if he would start building his own online business.

I said: “The chances of failing are ZERO if you don’t give up. The only way you can fail is if you stop trying.”

Any thoughts you want to share on the topic of being motivated to succeed online?

Dave shares 7 tips on how to keep motivated especially in the first 6 months of starting your website.

His last tip says “Never give up” and I agree that perseverance is the single most important factor of success regardless of what you want to achieve.

As long as you keep your goal in mind and work towards it, you’ll get there. But remember that having a goal to achieve financial freedom and just trying to get there will not work.

Lodewijk shares 46 more self-sabotage ways of thinking so check with yourself if you are on the right path to freedom.

I also liked Trevor’s tip on how to translate dreams into reality. Short but right to the point.

And when you start your journey towards being financially and personally free you may have to stop and think why you blog.

It’s dangerous to become too selfish and write only to earn more money. In my opinion, money is only one third of happiness so be aware of the other two factors all the time.

And last but not least, Matt shares his experience with paid links.

Being really wise means, that you are able to learn from mistakes of others without having to make them yourself and I appreciate Matt’s honesty by sharing what he learned.

If you really want to be free, not only financially but also free from worries, then don’t participate in link buying and selling schemes.

There is a way to win big in the Google game without having to cross over to the Dark Side.

Here are top 5 steps you can do this week:

1. Shine With Grace reminds you that if you really want to make it happen you need to create the picture in your mind first.

And if it is financial freedom you want, see it in your mind first. How would that feel? What would you do? What would you buy?

Enjoy that feeling for a few minutes and then sit behind your PC and make one step closer to being financially independent.

2. Untwisted Vortex has pot together a great list of Google related articles.

Since Google dominates the search engine world and is in 99% of the cases the biggest traffic referrer for any site, you might want to check the above articles to see what’s going on with Google.

Lots of traffic and good relationship with Google means more money and freedom!

Oh, I don’t forget to learn How to Play and Win Big In The Google game by yours truly too.

3. Speaking of traffic, ClearBlogging shares his findings on What makes a great blog great.

He took some time to check a few great blogs and came up with 5 conclusions of what makes a great blog great.

4. Jim Kukral encourages you to keep going even though Only a handful of blogs actually make money online.

I share the same views and the reason why so many people fail online is because it takes time.

The online game is really not that complicated to understand, but most of the people in this modern society are too impatient and undisciplined to keep it up for a year without getting much in return.

Don’t be one of them and never settle for being average!

5. Technical Itch offers some tips on how use Related Posts from Ultimate Tag Warrior with WordPress 2.3.

In order to achieve financial freedom you’ll need your technical stuff running smoothly.

After all, it’s the power of the Internet that allows us to earn passive income and these 5 tips from the blogosphere will hopefully get you one step closer to financial freedom.