Shaun Hogan, Owner of Digital Point Forum, Sued by eBay for Fraud

Shaun Hogan, the owner of the Digital Point Forum, one of the most popular webmaster forums, is being by eBay along with two other men for defrauding eBay in a cookie stuffing scheme.

I don't get this guy. He owns one of the most popular webmaster forums on the internet and has plenty of opportunities to earn money in legitimate ways. Unfortunately, it looks like greed got the better of him and he tried to take shortcuts to milk eBay.

You can find more about the lawsuit against Shaun Hogan at: eBay Inc. v. Digital Point Solutions, Inc. et al.

There are plenty of ex-members of Digital Point who got banned from the forum and are plenty angry at Digital Point. I guess this sounds like music to their ears now.

Below is the story from Courthouse News
eBay Sues Alleged "Cookie Stuffers"

SAN FRANCISCO (CN) - Three men defrauded eBay in a "cookie stuffing" scheme that made it appear the men’s companies should be paid commissions, eBay claims in Federal Court. It sued Shawn Hogan and Digital Point Solutions, Todd Dunning and Kessler’s Flying Circus, and Brian Dunning and Thunderwood Holdings.

eBay says the men devised software programs that, "unbeknownst to the [computer] user, redirected the user’s computer to the eBay Web site without the user actually clicking on an eBay advertisement link, or even becoming aware that they had left the page they were previously viewing. As a result, the eBay site would be prompted to drop an eBay cookie on the user’s computer even though the user never clicked on an eBay advertisement or even realized that their computer had ever visited the eBay site."

The complaint continues: "once the cookie was stuffed on the user’s computer by one or more of the defendant’s any future revenue actions initiated by that user when the user later visited eBay intentionally, and not as a result of any advertisement places by defendants, appeared to be eligible for commissions payable to one of the defendants".

eBay claims the defendants also used deceptive means to prevent it from discovering the fraud, and to conceal it. eBay demands compensatory, treble and punitive damages. It is represented by David Eberhart with O’Melveny & Myers.

Using SEO for effective Internet Marketing

If you are an Internet marketer and want to be successful in the field, you will find that your business will be more effective if you combine your marketing strategies with Search Engine Optimization.

Search Engine Optimization or SEO as it is commonly called is a must for Internet Marketing, especially if you want to reap from advertising.

Without SEO on your website, you not only run the risk of losing advertising business but your website would not stand a chance in the high rankings on search engine websites.

There are several different ways in which SEO optimization can be achieved. Keyword density, META tags, titles, inbound links and prominence are just some of the ways in which you can generate more hits and ranks to your website.

Probably the most widely used method for SEO optimization is keyword density. This method affords the web owner to use keywords that best describes his website's business or content. This means that if a person has a silver jewelry website specializing in selling rings for instance, their keywords would contain the words “jewelry”, or “rings” and “silver jewelry” to name a few.

When someone goes to a search engine website and enters a search using these keywords, your website would be on the search results list at a high ranking. Search engines mostly reward top position on the listing to those who use keywords

If someone were to use the aforementioned keywords at the search engine websites, then your website would be among your website would be found among the search and at a high rank as well. Search engines usually give high listing preference to those who utilize keyword density.

Keyword prominence is also good tactic for generating more hits. It has to do with how close you place your keywords at the beginning of the website. The keywords are inserted in the website's title along with META tags. META tags are HTML codes that are embedded into a website's heading that is not visible to the page's visitor.

Incorporating keywords into the code as oppose to the content on your website has proven to be very effective.

Why Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is big business these days. It is a mega marketing wave that most companies are riding on in order to achieve a portion or all monthly revenue.

Some may wonder why huge companies are also adding affiliate marketing to its business. Well the answer is simple. For starters, it really does not cost a company a whole lot if anything to get an affiliate marketing program going.

And then once the program commences, the company can only gain from this form of advertising. Here is a scenario about how affiliates marketing works. Company X has started an affiliate marketing program for their online store. This store carries a wide range of gift wrapping supplies.

When someone signs up, as an affiliate for Company X's website, they will in turn receive a code for a banner ad. This would be the new affiliate's personal code that they can later post at their own website or that of another website.

When the banner is clicked by a visitor to the website, they are then forwarded to the banner's address or the affiliates web store. The new affiliate would receive a set percentage of the sales that was generated from the banner promotion.

Other ways that an affiliate can gain from using a company's banner on their website is by the amount of traffic that they send to the company's web page. Even if a person arrives at the company's website and they don't make a purchase, if they sign up to be on the mailing list or complete a survey, it would still benefit the affiliate.

Some companies also utilize the pay-per-click system to reward their affiliates. Affiliates here are given a banner to place on their web page and every time the banner is clicked, the affiliate gains a percentage of money. Pay-per-click reward affiliates for the traffic they send to their website.

While pay-per-click is a good way to make money for the affiliate, it can also weaken a company that that runs an online store. What eventually happens in some cases is that more banner clicking is being done and when people are redirected to the website, they close the page without making a purchase.

So if you are a business considering affiliate marketing with pay-per-click and sales, you may want to think this through and carefully.

Finally, business owners are advised to partner with an affiliate that can generate more money for them and it would also help if your banner ads are colorful, catchy and worth a click.

Save Yourself a Headache: Here are Some Decent Web Hosting Companies

One of the most important decisions when starting a website is choosing the right web hosting company to host your website. A bad web host can cause your website to go down frequently or be inaccessible for long periods of time. This will turn away your visitors and drive your traffic to die down. Choosing the right web host could be the difference between success and failure.

I can't recall the number of times I had to complain to some web hosting companies that I had signed up with, or screamed over the phone or threatened legal actions. I have tried several web hosts throughout the years and had to change web hosts several times.

The process of changing web host is painful (moving files, recreating databases, waiting for DNS records to propagate through the internet) and usually results in significant downtime for your site and loss of emails. This is without mentioning the stress and aggravation that you get.

I can't stress enough how important it is to choose the right web hosting company.

Here are a few web hosting companies that I recommend, based on my own experience and also feedback that I have received from my friends:

midPhase Hosting
Bluehost Hosting
Hostgator Hosting
iPowerWeb Hosting
GoDaddy Hosting
Lunarpages Hosting
FatCow Hosting
iPower Hosting
PowWeb Hosting


Most basic hosting plans cost $7.95/month or lower. A basic plan is what I believe most webmasters should start out with, unless you expect your website to be an instant success. As you outgrow your plan, you can choose a more expensive hosting plan or go with dedicated hosting.

Some bloggers like Shoemoney really need to take some writing classes

I frequently read some blogs and I am amazed to find how some very popular blogs are full with spelling errors, grammatical mistakes and without proper punctuation. I wonder sometimes if those bloggers ever took some English classes. That's how bad some of their writings are! Yet, visitors flock to these blogs and I am not sure if they don't notice the bad writing or they simply don't care.

I have to admit that English is not my strongest point. English isn't my first language. It isn't my second language. It isn't even my third language. It's my fourth language! In college, I had take twice English 101 because I ended up with a D the first time I took it. However, I know how to use a Spell Checker. I usually type my blog entries in Microsoft Word which automatically highlights grammar and spelling mistakes. Then, I copy them back into my blog. If you know how to copy and paste, you can certainly do this too!

Don't these bloggers know how to use a Spell Checker? Don't they take the time to re-read or even proofread what they wrote? Do they take their job seriously enough to try to present something decent? I suspect they simply don't care because there are enough people out there willing to read their garbage.

If you read Shoemoney's blog posts, you will find so many spelling and grammar errors, missing punctuation that you got to wonder if he's ever taken or passed any English classes. I sometimes get lost in some of his blog posts. If he is making as much money as he claim, he has got to enroll into a community college and take some writing classes for his readers' sake. But I bet he won't. Not as long as we are willing to read anything that he puts out there!

Cool Online Deals Website to Help You Save on Your Holidays Shopping

Here is a cool Best Online Deals website that works like a social bargain hunting service. Basically, users submit the shopping deals that they have found online. Other users get to rate those deals. Deals are sorted on the main page based on the community votes.

This digg-like website offers a way for bargain hunters to quickly find the best shopping deals based on the recommendation of the website members.

The website is DealShouter.com. Check it out.

Why most websites fail within the first year

Did you know that most websites will eventually close or get abandoned by their owners within the first year?
In a world where more and more people get connected to the internet, you may wonder why the vast majority of websites fail to reach a significant portion of the internet audience and get abandoned before they make any serious money.
The answer will not surprise you. It’s the lack of originality and creativity. It’s the lack of commitment from the website owners, be it time, effort or financial commitment.

Lack of Originality

One of the most serious mistakes that webmasters often make is that to think that because a particular website has succeeded, they can copy the same model and get a share of its business. Take for example myspace. Since myspace has become popular, a lot of people have tried to duplicate the success of myspace by launching social networking websites similar to it. What they have basically achieved is to get a clone of myspace without adding anything more to it. Now, why would a person want to join a social networking website that is in essence identical to myspace but without the crowd that makes myspace so attractive?

You can find plenty of free or paid scripts nowadays that offer the same features of almost any well-known and successful website. You need a script that would function like digg.com, flickr.com, photobucket.com, etc…? Just search the internet and you’ll find plenty of those scripts. But don’t make the mistake thinking that you can install this script on a website and expect it to be as popular as the initial pioneers. If there is no value-add, there is no compelling reason for anyone to join up a service that is essentially a clone of an already well-established and well-known website. You can find plenty of clones of popular web services that use off-the-shelf scripts but very few to no people visit them and they are essentially dead.

Therefore, stop thinking that you want to be a myspace-like, or digg-like, or any other website-like. Be original. There is nothing wrong with copying an idea but you must add to it. Better yet, you must find a unique idea, a revolutionary idea. And you’ll be on your way to earn lots of money on the internet.

Lack of Commitment

When webmasters start a website, they often underestimate the amount of work that is needed to make the website successful. One of the most challenging tasks is promoting your website, getting people to know about your website and getting decent ranking with search engines. There are other tasks that are also very demanding such as updating your website with new features, new content or fixing bugs, managing your website such as answering emails, keeping your visitors or customers happy so they may return, fighting off spammers, preventing fraud, etc…

The most pressing task when starting a website is promoting it. This requires a huge commitment that you are not likely to see the benefit immediately and that you would need to sustain for a long time. This commitment requires a lot of time and effort and a lot of financial resources.

As an example of the work ahead, you would need to contact other webmasters to exchange or buy links with (this is called link building and is a must to get good ranking from search engines which typically judge a website popularity by how many other websites links to it). You would need to write articles or hire writers to write about your website and submit these articles to press release websites or news-sharing websites. You would need to post or talk about your website wherever you can. You would need to think about any other way to let the word out about your website.

Some of the items listed above may result in an immediate spike of traffic that would die down after a few days and would need to be repeated over and over again. Others would not have an immediate impact (such as link building or other search engine optimization – SEO – techniques) and you are not likely to see any benefits for several weeks if not months.

You also can not do it on the cheap. You would have to spend money initially on your website even though you would not be earning much in return. If you don’t want to spend any money initially, chances are, unless you are extremely lucky, you will not be able to make it. Invest your initial funds wisely. Ask your fellow webmasters about what works and what does not work and spend your money accordingly. You can join a webmaster forum such as WebmasterGround.com to get a tips from other webmasters. Also, don’t spend all your money in one shot. Any initial success may be short-lived. Instead, start slowly, budget for the long term, and spend your money in a sustained fashion. Learn from your experience and allocate your money to promotion techniques that have proven successful. Don’t get too concerned or loose your patience if you don’t get any immediate return.

Sustained commitment is undeniably what makes or breaks a website. If you don’t have the patience to work hard, spend hard and see very little benefit as you go, your website will likely fail to take off as you will quickly loose motivation.

How much time, effort and money should you invest before you know that your idea will not turn into successful website? That’s the million-dollar question. My answer is if you give it your best (do everything that you can to promote it and spend as much money as you can afford) for a full year and your website fails to take off, it may be time to ditch it.