Saturday, June 30, 2012
Vocaboly : Vocabulary Building Software for SAT GRE GMAT TOEFL
In case you aspire to study abroad, especially in the US and Australia, and English is not your first language then it might be quite a good idea to polish up your English vocabulary before taking the tests. While there are a large number of books and online resources which contain large 'word lists' for the various different exams, the number of interactive vocabulary building software for exams like SAT, GRE, GMAT and TOEFL are a bit harder to find. However, Vocaboly is one such software which facilitates vocabulary building for all the above mentioned international entrance/scholarship exams.
Vocaboly supports multiple users and stores each user's personal settings. It also has five dedicated 'books' (which are basically word lists along with definitions, pronunciations and sample sentences), one for each of SAT, GRE, GMAT and TOEFL and one for total beginners. But, this much can be found in any online or offline support tool for these exams. So what makes Vocaboly special? Well, quite a lot of things actually, and here's an in-exhaustive list:
Vocaboly supports multiple users and stores each user's personal settings. It also has five dedicated 'books' (which are basically word lists along with definitions, pronunciations and sample sentences), one for each of SAT, GRE, GMAT and TOEFL and one for total beginners. But, this much can be found in any online or offline support tool for these exams. So what makes Vocaboly special? Well, quite a lot of things actually, and here's an in-exhaustive list:
- Difficulty Levels and Filters: As you come across the different words (which are arranged alphabetically in the form of a list) you can assign a difficulty level, ranging from 0 to 5, to each word. Words of each difficulty level will be highlighted in a particular color for easy scanning. Further, Vocaboly also offers a filter facility by which you can search for words within a particular difficulty range as assigned by you
- Memory Cards: Vocaboly offers 8 memory cards for each book (SAT, GRE, GMAT, TOEFL and VOA). A memory card basically allows you to create your custom word lists or rather word arrays. For example you can create a memory card for homophones for easy revision.
- Pronunciation: Vocaboly has a pronunciation guide where a human American voice will read aloud any word/page you select. It also has a audio test where a word is read aloud and the meaning is provided and you have to spell it.
- Interactive Learning: Personally, I believe that it is important to make learning interactive in order to make learning interesting and Vocaboly does just that with the help of some basic but interesting games. My favorite is the classic memory game where you have to match every word to its meaning in order to complete the game. With timer, click counter and a hall-of-fame, the games definitely make learning a lot more fun.
Sunday, June 17, 2012
What I Think of the Hubpages Ad Program : Actual Earning Figures
As I have already mentioned in my previous post (please read it before continuing), Hubpages has recently launched the Hubpages Ad Program which enables hubbers (freelance Hubpages contributors) to earn some side income alongside there Google Adsense earnings as per the pre-existing Hubpages revenue share policy (60% Adsense ad display ratio).
I had also mentioned in that post that opinions were divided and it was too early make a call on whether it was a good thing or not for their writers seeing that it could potentially (read: most likely) negatively affect your Adsense earnings from your Hubs.
Well after seeing it in operation for close to3 months here is what is I think of the Hubpages Ad Program. I have also included my actually earnings from my Hubs for both Hubpages Ad Program and Google Adsense to give you a better idea. However, I must inform you beforehand that:
- I am not a very active Hubber (though I think Hubpages is easily the coolest content sharing site around). So it is very likely that you will earn a lot more from Hubpages than I have. Hence don't treat these figures out of context.Instead use them to just compare Adsense and the Hubpages Ad Program on a relative scale.
- Google Adsense usually serves CPC ads whereas the Hubpages Ad Program exclusively serves CPM ads which means that you will earn a few cents (or even dollars) in Adsense revenue every time an ad on your page is actually clicked but you will earn a fraction of a few cents every time your page is viewed. However, in both cases the rates depends greatly on the subject matter as well as the target audience of your contents. You can get a better idea of this by taking a look at the Adwords Keyword tool.
- The CPM rates offered by the Hubpages Ad Program are indeed a lot higher than those you can hope to get as a medium level publisher (as with 5000 monthly PVs). It is usually around the $5 mark but can be a lot higher as well whereas third party servers are likely to offer CPM rates of around $2 or even less if your main traffic source is Asia and Africa.
You can find my actual earning figures from Hubpages from both Adsense and Hubpages Ad Program by visiting this page. (I wanted to include it in the post itself but I just can't get the table to look right. Sorry.)
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Zurker : Own a Social Networking Site for Free !!!
Have you heard of Zurker yet? It is a new Social Networking sites which claims to be more fun than Facebook and is making no bones about the fact that toppling Facebook as the number social networking site is their main ambition--and that should tell you something about what its creators think about the potential for Zurker. However, it has one major difference from Facebook, Myspace and just about any other social networking sites--it is owned by its members and you get paid for Zurker's success.
How does the payment structure at Zurker work?
Zurker assigns its member vShares for every new successful referral. And I am very happy to say that Vshare isn't another one of those abstract revenue sharing rating points. Instead Vshare is simply a virtual share and will become a real share once Zurker get 1 million members. The value of one Vshare is one-millionth of the evaluation of Zurker. So here's the catch: only the people who refer the first 1 million people will be awarded Vshares. So it is best to join Zurker as soon as possible to maximize your chances of referring new members.
This is actually a great earning opportunity considering that Social Networking sites are some of the greatest money makers in the cyber world and even if Zurker falls way short of Facebook's $50 billion evaluation and is evaluated at just $50million (and that is quite a conservative estimnate considering Myspace fetched close to $600million and Bebo $800million), each vShare (which you are getting for free) will still earn you $50! Now that's not to shabby.
Other features of Zurker
Apart from this radical new development, Zurker has all the features you would expect in a social networking site. However, for obvious reasons Zuker doesn't allow multiple accounts and they are also planning to go open source sometime in the future. Another point to note about Zurker is that it has already introduced country specific TLDs (like in Blogger) and this shows that they are more than willing to adapt to the present scenario, which has now become almost a prerequisite for success on the internet.
The future of Zurker is still quite uncertain, but it has been building up members at an impressive rate and is already of PR4 site with an Alexa rank of around 58000. So I will definitely reccomend you to check out Zurker specially as it is completely free and easy to use.
Note:At present Zurker is in beta testing and you cannot sign up without an invitation. So ince you don't have one feel free to use mine (or click on any of the links to Zurker in the article above):
http://www.zurker.in/i-123003-ajdsilrbdk
How does the payment structure at Zurker work?
Zurker assigns its member vShares for every new successful referral. And I am very happy to say that Vshare isn't another one of those abstract revenue sharing rating points. Instead Vshare is simply a virtual share and will become a real share once Zurker get 1 million members. The value of one Vshare is one-millionth of the evaluation of Zurker. So here's the catch: only the people who refer the first 1 million people will be awarded Vshares. So it is best to join Zurker as soon as possible to maximize your chances of referring new members.
This is actually a great earning opportunity considering that Social Networking sites are some of the greatest money makers in the cyber world and even if Zurker falls way short of Facebook's $50 billion evaluation and is evaluated at just $50million (and that is quite a conservative estimnate considering Myspace fetched close to $600million and Bebo $800million), each vShare (which you are getting for free) will still earn you $50! Now that's not to shabby.
Other features of Zurker
Apart from this radical new development, Zurker has all the features you would expect in a social networking site. However, for obvious reasons Zuker doesn't allow multiple accounts and they are also planning to go open source sometime in the future. Another point to note about Zurker is that it has already introduced country specific TLDs (like in Blogger) and this shows that they are more than willing to adapt to the present scenario, which has now become almost a prerequisite for success on the internet.
The future of Zurker is still quite uncertain, but it has been building up members at an impressive rate and is already of PR4 site with an Alexa rank of around 58000. So I will definitely reccomend you to check out Zurker specially as it is completely free and easy to use.
Note:At present Zurker is in beta testing and you cannot sign up without an invitation. So ince you don't have one feel free to use mine (or click on any of the links to Zurker in the article above):
http://www.zurker.in/i-123003-ajdsilrbdk
Monday, April 23, 2012
Hubpages Launches the Hubpages Ad Program
A couple of months back Hubpages had announced the beta launch of their very own Hubpages Ad Program which would enable contributers to earn more money from their Hubs should they decide to opt in for it. Initially it was based on an invite only basis and they had hoped to make it open to all the Hubbers by June-July.
Well, things seems to have worked out perfectly for the Hubpages team and they have already opened up the Hubpages Ad Program to all their contributers and thereby joined a very small number of sites (Triond.com being another one) which enables its writers to earn both direct revenue as well as revenue through 3 rd party ad servers like Google Adsense.
How the Hubpages Ad Program Works?
To get the HAP ads to run on your Hubs you need to opt in for the program and fill out a Tax form and provide a Paypal ID. In case you are a bit apprehensive of sending your tax info online, you may also fax it to the Hubpages team. For non-US individual operators like myself the "tax form" is very basic and basically amounts to a statement confirming that my Hubpages earnings has nothing to do with anyone or anything in the States.
After you fill in these details Hubpages will verify whether your Hubs meet their ad serving T&C and then start displaying Hubpages ads on those hubs which they judge as having appropriate content.
Payout threshold is a rather high $50 (compared to Triond's 50 cents) and payment is made through Paypal. So effectively, if Paypal services are available in your country then you can earn from the Hubpages Ad Program.
However, a very important thing you should know about the Hubpages Ad Program is that you must have an active Adsense account in order to run HAP ads on your hubs even though there is no direct link between the two affiliate programs.
Will You Really Earn More With the Hubpages Ad Program?
Well , I guess this is definitely the most important you have ask regarding the Hubpages Ad Program and it rather a tricky question to answer, specially considering that the program is very new (a week old at the most) and I have up signed up for it just a few hours ago. But one thing is for sure: the Hubpages Ad Program definitely sounds like it can give Adsense a real run for its money as far as making money from Hubpages is concerned.
For one thing, Hubpages is a major online publisher with millions of PVs every month. This mean that it has access some very lucrative CPM ad programs which normal publishers like you and me won't have.
However, it is also important to realize that once you decide to run Hubpages Ad Program ads on your site it will encroach on your Adsense ad zones and so you may expect to see a dip in your Adsense earnings from your hubs. But whether there will be an over all increase in your Hubpages earnings is time will tell and (as far as I can read the situation) it may very well vary from publisher to publisher depending on their Hub style, content and niche. But there is no reason to get overly pessimistic as beta level testing seems to have produced encouraging results. So go ahead, cross your fingers and give it a shot!
Well, things seems to have worked out perfectly for the Hubpages team and they have already opened up the Hubpages Ad Program to all their contributers and thereby joined a very small number of sites (Triond.com being another one) which enables its writers to earn both direct revenue as well as revenue through 3 rd party ad servers like Google Adsense.
How the Hubpages Ad Program Works?
To get the HAP ads to run on your Hubs you need to opt in for the program and fill out a Tax form and provide a Paypal ID. In case you are a bit apprehensive of sending your tax info online, you may also fax it to the Hubpages team. For non-US individual operators like myself the "tax form" is very basic and basically amounts to a statement confirming that my Hubpages earnings has nothing to do with anyone or anything in the States.
After you fill in these details Hubpages will verify whether your Hubs meet their ad serving T&C and then start displaying Hubpages ads on those hubs which they judge as having appropriate content.
Payout threshold is a rather high $50 (compared to Triond's 50 cents) and payment is made through Paypal. So effectively, if Paypal services are available in your country then you can earn from the Hubpages Ad Program.
However, a very important thing you should know about the Hubpages Ad Program is that you must have an active Adsense account in order to run HAP ads on your hubs even though there is no direct link between the two affiliate programs.
Will You Really Earn More With the Hubpages Ad Program?
Well , I guess this is definitely the most important you have ask regarding the Hubpages Ad Program and it rather a tricky question to answer, specially considering that the program is very new (a week old at the most) and I have up signed up for it just a few hours ago. But one thing is for sure: the Hubpages Ad Program definitely sounds like it can give Adsense a real run for its money as far as making money from Hubpages is concerned.
For one thing, Hubpages is a major online publisher with millions of PVs every month. This mean that it has access some very lucrative CPM ad programs which normal publishers like you and me won't have.
However, it is also important to realize that once you decide to run Hubpages Ad Program ads on your site it will encroach on your Adsense ad zones and so you may expect to see a dip in your Adsense earnings from your hubs. But whether there will be an over all increase in your Hubpages earnings is time will tell and (as far as I can read the situation) it may very well vary from publisher to publisher depending on their Hub style, content and niche. But there is no reason to get overly pessimistic as beta level testing seems to have produced encouraging results. So go ahead, cross your fingers and give it a shot!
Sunday, March 11, 2012
Get Paid to Write Sites You Haven't Heard Of : Part 2
This is a continuation (or second installment if you prefer) of my reasonably popular hub Get Paid to Write Sites You Haven't Heard Of where I have mentioned a number of less popular but 100% legit and quite profitable get paid to write sites which do not have the backing of Yahoo! and don't make as much noise as Associated Content, but can quietly earn you a reasonable amount of money. So lets get rolling then:
Looking For Clues
Looking for Clues is the stand out site in this list because it is one of the few sites which offer an upfront payment ($10-$20) for your articles instead of revenue share. Approval period for LFC is rather long drawn and can take between 2 weeks and a month, but if you follow their criteria and write passably good English (no need to be absolutely perfect) then you have a pretty good chance of getting published. LFC also expects its contributers to drive traffic to the site and your payout for subsequent articles increases if you can manage to generate sufficient number hits to your articles. You can also promote your other sites and blogs through an author box.
Snipsly
Looking For Clues
Looking for Clues is the stand out site in this list because it is one of the few sites which offer an upfront payment ($10-$20) for your articles instead of revenue share. Approval period for LFC is rather long drawn and can take between 2 weeks and a month, but if you follow their criteria and write passably good English (no need to be absolutely perfect) then you have a pretty good chance of getting published. LFC also expects its contributers to drive traffic to the site and your payout for subsequent articles increases if you can manage to generate sufficient number hits to your articles. You can also promote your other sites and blogs through an author box.
Snipsly
Snipsly is arguably the most popular site in this list and fast becoming a rival for the likes of Infobarrel and Xomba. The things that has enabled Snipsly to gain such widespread popularity amongst the online writer community are
- Snipsly's revenue share is better than almost every other Adsense revenue sharing site with an author ad display ratio of 80%
- You can write about anything you want and have no issues getting it published so long as it is unique and over 3 sentences long.
- All links are dofollow. So you can use Snipsly to generate quality backlinks
- Snipsly uses the popular WordPress format and many writers are already so familiar with it that they can just start creating great content without having to familiarize with the user interface.
Seekyt
Seekyt is yet another Adsense revenue sharing site where the author ad display ratio is 70%.Content must be unique and substantial. Check my detailed review of Seekyt and how it is evolving into a major player in the industry.
Zestbit
Zestbit is a Squidoo style publishing platform (but obviously not as cool) where you can earn revenue share from a number of affiliate programs by creating Twists. Like Squidoo, you can earn from Zestbit without having any affiliate accounts in general and Adsense account in particular.
Seekyt is yet another Adsense revenue sharing site where the author ad display ratio is 70%.Content must be unique and substantial. Check my detailed review of Seekyt and how it is evolving into a major player in the industry.
Zestbit
Zestbit is a Squidoo style publishing platform (but obviously not as cool) where you can earn revenue share from a number of affiliate programs by creating Twists. Like Squidoo, you can earn from Zestbit without having any affiliate accounts in general and Adsense account in particular.
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