Working at Home on the Internet

The Mysterious Missing TLA Ads

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Some of you who have been subscribed to my RSS Feed (subscribe) for a while now may have noticed that I had some Advertisements running at the bottom of the feed. They were personal ads, leading to the Forum, an affiliate program and lastly for my Hire Me page. They were all part of the Text Link Ads Feedvertising (advertise on feed) feature.

Since April 4th None of the ads have shown on the feed and I didn’t have any idea why they just stopped showing. I had contacted the support people at Text Link Ads (aff) as soon as I realized there was a problem and got no response. I finally contacted Patrick Gavin, President of TLA, to explain my situation and how disappointed I was with the lack of response to my queries.

Patrick did respond personally within 2 days that they were researching the problem, but didn’t have any answers yet. We communicated back and forth a few times, and the answer was that they had no answer. It seems that no one else had reported such a problem, but they would continue to research it.

It has been over a month since this problem started and I still haven’t gotten any satisfaction or answers on how to fix it. I decided to research it myself, looking for any clue as to what was causing the disappearance of my RSS Ads.

As I mentioned, the Ads showed until 4/4 and then stopped abruptly. What I did was load all my feeds in my RSS Reader. I went back to when they showed and started looking. Everything for TLA was downloaded and installed properly, ads show in the sidebar as they should and I even had an ad that was sold for an individual post showing.

Still nothing in the Feed showed. But, I think I found the answer.

Shortly after the ads stopped showing (actually the next day) I had installed the WP-Polls Plug-in. It uses Ajax for polls. For whatever reason, that seems to be interfering with the function of the TLA Plug-in that governs the RSS Ads.

I have deactivated the Polls Plug-in, I don’t really need it that badly. Hopefully, That is the Answer.

So, if all you RSS Subscribers would do me a favor and keep an eye out to see if the Ads start showing at the bottom of the Feed and drop me a comment or an eMail, I would be very grateful. Thanks.

Tip: Watch your Plug-ins, they may cause some unseen and unwanted problems.

Update: I just received an eMail from Patrick Gavin, President of TLA, and they upgraded the plug-in for this type of situation. He thinks it will solve the problem. I uploaded the new version right after his mail, so let’s hope it works. Keep an eye open please. And Patrick, thanks for responding to an affiliates needs, it is very much appreciated and shows how professional you and your company are.

Update II: IT WORKS!!! I just rechecked my Feed and it shows one of my Ads at the bottom. THANKS Patrick and team…

Technorati Tags: Text Link Ads, TLA, Patrick Gavin, Plugin

May 21st, 2007 at 12:03pm | Posted by Joe | Advertising, Plug-ins, RSS | 10 reader remarks | Print This Post

Calling All Home Business Owners

The Featured Home Business page is one of the most popular and most viewed pages on Working at Home on the Internet. But, I am Really Curious to know if it is actually doing a service for those Businesses. I know that there are increased pageviews here each time a New Business is Featured, but does that translate into additional views of the Companies Home Page? Has it helped them in the longer term by any increased exposure?

I hope so, that’s the main reason I started Featuring Home Businesses in the First Place, to give another avenue for them to be seen by more potential Customers.

I thought including a list of all the Business that have participated in this venture so far would be a good idea so that others who haven’t seen the original postings would have chance to see what I’m talking about.

Participants So Far:

• Featured on 1/2/07… Wellsprings Coaching… founded and managed by Laura Young, MA who brings a lot to the table in the field of Personal Development.
• Featured on 1/3/07… Perfect Virtual Manager… Liz Strauss has worked over 20 years in print, software, and online publishing and has been a VP and Publisher for an American textbook company. A real Expert in Management
• Featured on 1/4/07… Anubis Marketing… Lara Kulpa, President and Founder. This is a full-service marketing company offering web design and development, internet marketing, blog development, and many other related web services.
• Featured on 1/8/07… Jesse Skinner, Freelance Web Developer… Jesse Skinner is a recently self-employed developer specializing in JavaScript, Ajax and CSS. If you need help in any of these areas, I suggest you call on Jesse.
• Featured on 1/15/07… Whirled Events… Carolyn Goodwin works with individuals and organizations to spread the joy of giving and to help people build personal and professional relationships through giving unique, personal and meaningful gifts. This is Full Service Gift giving at it’s best.
• Featured on 1/22/07… Fish Creek House… Innkeepers Cid and Dan Busarow will make you feel right at home in their beautiful log home Bed & Breakfast, and can assist you in planning your visit around Big Sky country in Montana, USA.
• Featured on 2/19/07… Sheila Scarborough, Freelance Writer… Sheila Scarborough began writing part-time while on active duty with the US Navy, and is now enjoying a successful career as a full-time freelance writer, specializing in travel but conversant in a variety of topics.
• Featured on 3/5/07… Good News Now … I think there is a New Category of the Work at Home Entrepreneur, Freelance Webmaster. Ruth Eshbaugh is just such an Entrepreneur and I’d like to introduce you to her.

And in case you are wondering, there are no strings attached. No unauthorized advertisements, linking, e-mail, spamming or anything underhanded at all. None of these Endorsements are Paid. This is purely my attempt to help any Home Business Entrepreneur in any way I can through cooperative exposure.

This is an ongoing way to try to help Home Business owners Showcase their wares and professions.

If you have a Home Business of any type that you would like to promote, take a look at thethe Links in the List Above to get an idea of the Great Businesses submitted so far and how they presented their businesses here.

Then, Check out the Rules for Inclusion and how to Submit your Home Business.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention… Any Feedback from Past Participants is Most Welcome, as are comments from anyone wishing to have a say.

Technorati Tags: Wellsprings Coaching, Perfect Virtual Manager, Anubis Marketing, Jesse Skinner, Whirled Events, Fish Creek House, Sheila Scarborough, Good News Now, Featured Home Business

March 14th, 2007 at 12:39pm | Posted by Joe | Advertising, Featured Home Business', Work at Home | 7 reader remarks | Print This Post

No Ads on Feeds with TLA?

 

I have been running Text Link Ads (aff) for a few months now. I have gotten over 500 hits on the link to the Affiliate Program, but almost nothing on the TLA for Feedvertising (link). Since the Link to the Ad for Feeds is on the Blog, I thought no one was interested.

I started wondering why, since Feedvertising is for Feeds, that the plugin they give you doesn’t show anything on the Feed? You would think that since the plugin shows an Icon for “Feedvertise Here” on the Blog, that at least a Text Link Ad would show on the Feed. But, there is Nothing.

 I contacted TLA to ask how I might get at least a link to their site on the feed so subscribers might know there is a possibility of advertising on my feed.

I got an answer fairly quickly from Patrick Gavin (President of TLA) that the process is as easy as creating a Custom Ad (including my ID URL) within my Feedvertising account and it would show on my feed. I did as he suggested, and also put a personal Ad for the Working at Home on the Internet Forum.

So, if you don’t mind, Please let me know in comments if you see… either, both or neither of the Ads I have (hopefully) put on the Feed.

Update: Something not told to me is that you FIRST need to Edit your listings/Edit site details to the Number for Personal use. Go throug all the setps and Save. THEN go to Feedvertising, you should notice the Number is what you want. Set up the Ads at the bottom of the page and Save. Now you should see your Ads saved and right above it (them) you should see what the ad will look like on your Feed. I think this works, but, we shall see soon.

Technorati Tags: Text Link Ads, TLA, Feedvertising, RSS, Feeds

February 8th, 2007 at 04:09pm | Posted by Joe | Advertising, RSS, Work at Home | 4 reader remarks | Print This Post