RORY HANSEN

I’ve spent the last couple hours debugging an authentication issue with LinkShare‘s Link Locator Direct web service. My console app was throwing the following exception:

System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapException: org.apache.axis.AxisFault:Pass in username/password

The error message seems straight-forward enough– “Pass in username/password.” But what do you do if you know you are passing in the username and password?

This was the code I was using:

LinkShareTextPromotion.EJBTextPromotionServiceService tp =
     new LinkShareTextPromotion.EJBTextPromotionServiceService();
tp.Credentials = new NetworkCredential(username, password);
tp.PreAuthenticate = true;
LinkShareTextPromotion.Text[] results  = tp.GetAllLinks(sid);

Anyway, I finally lucked out and stumbled onto this link on the LinkShare forums, which lead me to Gordon Weakliem’s blog that had a working solution. Apparently this problem occurs due to how .NET authenticates.

If you’re experiencing the same error and got here via Google, then I hope this helps you get on your way.

Back in April, I wrote on this blog how, after just a couple months, I was making over $20/month using Text-Link-Ads.com. Even back then, I was happy with $20/month, as it required no work on my part at all. Text-Link-Ads.com customers would search the Text-Link-Ads.com directory, find my site, and then choose to advertise. To borrow a phrase my old math teacher used to say, “It’s like money for jam.”

Five months later, my monthly income has increased to $39.10/month, which is nearly 100% more than what I was making when I posted my initial review of the service. And at what cost? None! Have I invested hours of my time grooming my site for Text-Link-Ads? No. Essentially, the only time I even remember I am using their service is when I get emails from PayPal informing me that I’ve received a new $40 deposit into my account.

Anyway, I guess my point is, if you’re looking for an easy way of monetizing your site, take a look at Text-Link-Ads.com (Non-affiliate link here). For me, the income has proven to be steady and reliable, while still growing month-over-month.

Have you heard of Text-Link-Ads.com? They are another way of diversifying how your website is earning you income each month.

I started using Text-Link-Ads.com about two months ago, and so far, I’m up to earning just over $20/month and it’s still increasing month over month.

How does it work?
Essentially, you earn money each month for linking to other websites. So, you might have a technology blog and, using Text-Ad-Links.com, you’ll advertise other technology websites by linking to them from your blog. The websites that you link to benefit by (potentially) higher search engine results positions (SERPs), as each backlink that they get from other related websites can boost their page rank and keyword ranking for the niche that they are targetting.

In the end, everyone benefits.

My experiences:
In the first month of usage, not even one other website wanted to advertise on the two blogs that I submitted to TLA. But in the last few weeks, I’ve managed to sign up four links…. with each link earning me just over $6 per month. NOT BAD, EH!?

How do you sign up?
If you’re interested in signing up, please consider using my affiliate link. Not only will you be earning new income each month, but my earnings will increase too.

Sign up for Text-Ad-Links.com and earn yourself additional income from your website each month!

Otherwise, here is a non-affiliate link.

Adsense: $236.07
Firefox Referrals: $793.10

Yahoo! Marketing: $167.39
Google Adwords: $271.80
MSN AdCenter: $5.62
Ask! Sponsored Listings: $68.38

Profit: $515.98

Commentary: During the course of the month, I noticed conversions were steadily decreasing. I began to cut back on some of the traffic which was less targetting (ie, the content network traffic) so my costs are slightly below where they were for December. But you’ll notice that my revenue is off by more than 50%. This all adds up to a profit which is about 1/3 of the profit I had back in December.

Why? Really, I dunno. I suppose the easy answer is to suggest that it’s becoming harder and harder to attract users to my site that haven’t already installed Firefox or the Google Toolbar at least once in their past. Either that, or I’m not properly advertising to the right audience.

In any case, if profits decrease again next month, I’ll have to seriously think about whether it’s worth it to keep the Firefox/Google Toolbar site running.

Adsense: $98.05

Yahoo! Marketing: $291.44
Google Adwords: $369.26
MSN AdCenter: $6.24
Ask! Sponsored Listings: $7.40

Referrals: $955.60

Profit: $379.31

So, earlier this week I was looking for information on taxes for small businesses in Canada, specifically Internet-based businesses. I googled and eventually stubled upon the Small Business: Canada section on About.com, which is a great resource!

I ended up bookmarking two links:

• Calculating The Home Business Tax Deduction
• 7 Ways to Make Record Management Easy

I bookmarked the 7 Ways to Make Record Management Easy page because my current method is just not working. Maybe that’s because my current method actually means no method, but that aside, the tips that have been recommended do make sense and aren’t too hard to implement. The page mentions that credit card statements aren’t suitable records for prooving expenses and earnings, which is unfortunate since most of the costs for my Internet-based business are in the form of regular monthly charges to my credit card, such as hosting fees and PPC advertising fees. I guess what this means is that I’ll have to make it a point of actually printing out the invoices from these companies on a fairly regular basis now and then storing those away until tax time.

I also learned that as a sole proprietorship, I can simply fill out one additional form when doing my personal income taxes. That additional form is the T2124 Statement of Business Activities form. And while it looks fairly complicated to fill out, there’s a guide available on the Canada Revenue Agency website called the Business and Professional Income Guide which has step-by-step instructions on how to fill out the T2124 form.

Wanted: Income tax information for Internet-based businesses in Canada

I am looking for books, eBooks, or websites.

If you know of any good ones, please let me know! Revenue from my websites is getting to the point where I’d better cover my bases before the Gov’t comes after me.  : )

Google Adsense: $82.30

Firefox + Google Toolbar Referrals: $2,000.01

Yahoo! Marketing: $435.90
Google Adwords: $539.02
MSN AdCenter: $3.21

Profit: $1,104.18

Cost/earnings breakdown:

Yahoo! Marketing: ($145.96)
Google Adwords: (116.47)
MSN AdCenter: ($0.09)

Referrals: $592.40

Total Profit: $329.88

Milestones Dates:

Nov 2: Started website
Nov 10: Broke $3/day barrier
Nov 20: Broke $10/day barrier
Nov 23: Broke $25/day barrier
Nov 27: Broke $50/day barrier
Nov 28: Broke $75/day barrier
Nov 29: Broke $125/day barrier
Nov 30: Broke $175/day barrier

My goal is to send as much targetted traffic to my Firefox + Google Toolbar website as I can, while keeping the cost per visitor as low as possible. That way, the margins I’m making through Firefox conversions are as large as possible. So, along with Google Adwords and Yahoo! Search Marketing, I’ve also signed up for MSN AdCenter, in an attempt to buy as much cheap traffic as I can get my hand on.

This is what I’m thinking. If I raise my PPC cost, my ads will appear higher in search results. This will generally send more traffic to my site which should also raise the number of Firefox conversions I get per day. But, on the flipside, I’ll also be paying more for all of this traffic, reducing the profit I’m making. As well, this significantly raises the possibility that I’ll actually LOSE money some days, on occasions when my conversion ratio drops.

So my decision up to this point is to pay just enough so that my ads appear 3rd or 4th or 5th on the search results. Yes, clicks on my ads are much lower when they are positioned like this, but I’m also paying much less per click than if I were to appear 1st or 2nd. So, to squeeze as many clicks as I can while keeping costs pretty low, I’ve had to sign up for other PPC programs. First there was Yahoo! Search Marketing (where I got a $50 credit), then Google Adwords (where I got another credit), and finally, today, signed up for MSN AdCenter (but unfortunately, could not find any promo codes that would work for Canadians). PPC costs seem pretty low when I signed up with my first campaign (between $0.05 and 0.08 per click) at least when compared to Yahoo! Internet Marketing, but we’ll see if the program generates much traffic.

One thing I realize I need to do, is set up specialized landing pages for each of these campaigns so that I can better gauge how I’m doing. Right now, since all the PPC traffic is being directed to the same page, I know that I’m profitting from my PPC participation, but I cannot see if I’m doing better with one program (say, Yahoo! Internet Marketing) when compared to another (like Google Adwords).

Anyway, we’ll leave that for another night.