CornerScribe

Archive for January, 2007

Here’s another vacation site, in this case advertising a Costa Rica Vacation. They include lots of pictures and some information about the resorts, so I can see how this might be a handy starting point if you’re looking for an exotic location in which to set your next novel or short story.

As an aside, I love the picture of the man and woman having wine at their cafe table. They look like they have surf boards rammed up the back of their shirts. I’m all for good posture, but they have to be kidding. Wouldn’t you just love to write a story about them? Mr. and Mrs. Uptight… okay, so they probably need the vacation.

It appears that they cater to more high-end vacations, so if you’re looking to set your novel in a seedy coastal town somewhere, this isn’t the place to start looking.

Where do you do your research for setting? Do you insist on having to visit the place yourself, or do you do your research and “wing it” when you start writing?

Here’s what I’ve learned about Blogitive.

• It doesn’t matter if your post really has a lot to do with the web release. Some of the ones I’ve done had very little in common with the release, but they were approved.
• The blog entries have to be on the main page, I think. I submitted one and got it approved, but the next one that wasn’t on the home page was rejected. I guess someone was a bit more diligent in checking the posts.
• Offers are sporadic. You may go a few days with none and then suddenly see three or four show up. Accept them all and decide later if you really want to do them. Many of these are limited, so if you don’t accept it right away, it can disappear in a few hours.
• They approve the blogs in a day or so, on average. Some get looked at in a matter of hours, but I had one that took a couple of days to get approved.
• They do pay out weekly, as promised.

Of course, the question is, do you want to put this type of entry on your blog, or do you want to keep the blog “pure.” I have to admit that I’m still torn. It’s nice to make a little cash from the blog to help pay for hosting, etc., but I’m concerned that it will make the blog cluttered.

Another problem is that this type of thing really screws with the Google Adsense code on the page. I’m getting all sorts of ads now, instead of only the writing related ones that I’d prefer.

If any of the above changes, I’ll be sure to post about it, but for now, this is probably the last Blogitive review. I’d like to hear your feedback about the ads. Do they bother you, or do you simply ignore them?

This is interesting. According to this study, women prefer masculine looking men (romance novel material) for short term relationships, but prefer more feminine looking men for marriage and long term relationships.

It makes me think about how I match people up in my novels. I don’t write romance, but my characters do often have romantic relationships. I’m wondering how realistic my writing is. Let’s face it, few people are romance novel material, so it’s better to include a few pot bellies and receding hairlines too.

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Here’s another Blogitive ad. I’ll be writing more about Blogitive later.

Simmons, Jannace & Stagg is a LLP that practices in New York, Connecticut and New Jersey. I wonder about the reasons why a law firm would buy link advertising. Does a law firm need to boost their search engine rankings? I guess in the internet age, everyone does.
They practice a wide variety of law, in the states mentioned above, and count among their clients Home Depot U.S.A., Inc., Bank of America Corp., J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., Kmart Holding Corp., Best Buy Co. Inc. and several others.

One of their “selling points” is that they think outside the box. Lawyers are widely seen in internet culture as being a little (or a lot) out of touch, so it’s refreshing to see that they at least claim to be different.

I’ve mentioned the flylady website before. She has a new book out, but you may already have seen it, since it’s been hovering around the top of Amazon’s chart for weeks. The book is Body Clutter.

This is a great example of using a market that you’ve already developed to sell a book. Marla Cilley (flylady) has hundreds of thousands of subscribers to her daily emails, so that’s a built-in market for anything she writes. I think that’s what many writers try to do with their blogs (or other marketing.)

One thing that I have to give to flylady is that she seems genuinely concerned with her subscribers, and she doesn’t hide away the “good stuff” on the site only for paying customers. In fact, her site has no paying customers. I think that’s one reason she’s built such huge ranks of loyal followers, and why they’re eager to rush out and buy her book.

Check out this site for Scrivener, a very good looking piece of writing software. Before you get too excited, it’s available only for OS X (Mac), so if you’re a Windows person or Linux person, you’re out of luck.

Since I’m on Windows, I can’t use it either, but it looks terrific. I’d love to be able to try it out — does anyone know if you can emulate a Mac on a Windows or Linux box?

Anyone else have a favorite piece of writing software you’d like to recommend? I’m looking for something that offers some outlining, reorganizing, and writing capability. That’s what led me to find Scrivener, but I’m looking for something that won’t require that I buy a new computer!

This is another of the Blogitive ads I’ve been talking about. This one is just what it sounds like, Boston Condos. Also, the site looks relatively new, or perhaps they just have a lot of turnover. When I looked around earlier, they had one condo for sale, one for rent, and no vacation property.

I had hoped for more photos — at least it would have been a handy reference for writing scenes if that had been the case. Personally, I like to use pictures of rooms, houses, etc. to help me remember what some of my scenes look like. If I’m writing a scene that’s heavily dependent on the surroundings, then having pictures is particularly helpful. There’s nothing more frustrating when writing than having to stop and think about what I’ve already written about a setting.

I had hoped for something similar here, but alas, few pictures.

As of now, I’ve gotten four new offers on Blogitive, so perhaps my complaint of no new offers yesterday was a bit premature.

Also, I had a second blog rejected because it’s less than ninety days old. I can understand their limitation; otherwise, it would be all too easy to start a host of blogs just for this purpose and then abandon them later. If I were an advertiser, I’d insist on putting my money (even just $5!) in a blog that has a track record for being around.

Stay tuned for more updates on Blogitive.

Here’s the latest Blogitive update, for those who are interested.

I did the last post on the 21st and was paid today for all three. That’s good; they paid weekly as promised.

I submitted a second blog (a relatively new one of mine) last week and just got a response today. I thought that was a bit long to wait for an answer, especially since their submission form says two days.

What concerns me about them now is that I’ve gotten no new offers since I completed my last one three days ago. If you’re hoping to make some extra cash from Blogitive, that certainly puts a damper in things, doesn’t it? Perhaps they’re still working on attracting advertisers; I have read that they have many more bloggers than advertisers at this point, so that may be the problem.

I’ll let you know when (and if) I get another offer.

I find it odd, even amusing, that there are people out there who will purchase gold, gold bars or other precious metals and have them delivered to their homes. Now, I can understand the investing in precious metals, but having them delivered to your home? Granted, Monex does both, and I’m guessing that the vast majority of people put the gold coins in a bank somewhere and just enjoy knowing that they have it. Maybe they take a picture of it or something, but they keep it safe.

Still, you know there’s a handful of people out there with a chest full of gold coins stashed in the attic or the back of a closet. Maybe they pull them out and drool over them sometimes, or worry that someone will find them when they go out. Doesn’t that give you the most interesting ideas for your next greedy miser? Or how about moving in to a place and finding something like that? Cha-ching!