Everywhere you turn people tell you the same thing about search engines; Google is the best search engine. Google is certainly the biggest search engine company. Depending upon whose numbers you want to believe, Google’s search market share is a whopping 71% or more. Google processes hundreds of millions of search queries every day and uses so many servers, computers, routers, and networking equipment that it recently got into the power business. But, does that make Google the best search engine? How good are its search results?

Quality of Google Search Results Page Rankings

Answering the question of how good Google’s searches are is not straightforward. There are numerous factors that can go into ranking websites and webpages as the best search result, or the number 38 search result. Which ones to include and how much weight each search ranking factor should be given is a matter of opinion. Some may claim that larger, better known, results should rank highest, while others would claim that the democratization of information is exactly what makes the Internet so powerful, therefore, no preference should be given to “mainstream” websites or their pages.

However, examining Google’s search results with human eyes often provides some insight into how well the company is doing when it ranks websites in the top ten search results. (UPDATE: The guys over at Search Engine Journal published a different look at what I was getting at here.)

Check out my freelance financial writer page.

Google tracks the preferences and history of most users. It uses this data to “personalize” the search results for that person. For example, if you often search for something like denver sightseeing, a search for something like tourist attractions may be skewed toward attractions in Denver, even though denver was not included in that particular search. Furthermore, if you often visit a specific website, especially by clicking on its links from searches, that site may be pumped up to a higher position in future searchers.

Many writers seeking to earn money writing online fall victim to this trap. Since they logically visit their own websites more frequently than others, they are likely to rank higher in most searches performed by the website author. Unfortunately, this often leads new writers into believing that they rank much higher than they really do for a particular search.

Always perform any searches that you want to use to see how things look to everyone else in your browser’s privacy mode. Google Incognito mode is useful for seeing unpersonalized search results and is my personal favorite, because it does not shut down your regular browsing session to go private.

Once you have launched a private browsing session, type in a few Google searches that you think would be productive ways of finding valuable information. Obviously, two word searches are difficult because there can be so much interpretation. Try better searches with three or four words. For an example, try “LCD versus Plasma”. Then try “LCD vs Plasma”.

Despite Google’s insistence that it handles synonyms for you in searches, the differences between the results when using “versus” instead of “vs” are very different. This is technically an abbreviation, not a synonym, but the point remains that what results you get for your searches depends very much on EXACTLY what you search for. That is why writing to multiple keywords is so important.

You’ll notice throughout this site (and even in this article) I make an effort to link back for both “earn money writing online” AND “make money writing online” because it really does matter.

When you are out there writing content for yourself or your clients and building powerful backlinks to your best stuff, be sure to do the same. Otherwise, the best search engine in the world might not rank you as high as you deserve based on one tiny little word.

A new Colorado law to force Amazon to collect sales taxes resulted in Amazon Associates being terminated in Colorado.

The law was crafted to get around a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that states that a retailer need collect state imposed taxes on sales only if the retailer has a significant enough physical presence in the state, or a “nexus” of business in the state. Since Colorado can not directly compel Amazon to collect sales taxes, the state instead passed a law deliberately making it nuisance to do business with residents of Colorado.

Technically, whenever a person makes an online purchase, they still owe the sales tax due on that purchase even if the online vendor does not collect the tax directly. The customer is legally obligated to voluntarily forward the appropriate sales tax payment directly to the state, which, of course, never happens. The new Colorado sales tax law states that for any sales made via Colorado residents who participate in the Amazon Associates program to customers whose purchases are shipped to a Colorado address, Amazon must mail a letter to the customer stating the amount of sales tax the customer owes.

Colorado Sales Tax Law Designed To “Get Around” The Constitution

What makes this new Colorado law so slimy and underhanded is how disingenuous it is. Both the State of Colorado and Amazon know that sending these letters will not result in any significant increase in the amount of sales taxes collected by the state. In fact, the only real effect of the legally required letters will be to waste more paper, and increase the cost of doing business in Colorado for Amazon. The legislation’s supporters hoped the law would be such a burden that Amazon would choose to just collect the sales taxes for the state instead. In other words, the legislature deliberately passed a law that they didn’t want anyone to follow in order to make companies do something that the state cannot legally force them to do. It’s a trick worthy of the sneakiest con artist.

The law is also decidedly self-serving since it only compels online retailers to notify residents of how much state sales tax they owe. There is no requirement to notify residents of any city or local taxes that they might owe on their purchases!

Of course, Amazon has no intention of implementing such a burdensome procedure. To track which sales were made via Colorado based Amazon affiliates, and then match those sales to shipping addresses in Colorado, and then to mail those residents letters telling them how much state sales tax they owed, would be a big logistical challenge, even if the company did want to comply with the law.

Instead, Amazon responded the same way it has in the past, by terminating the participation of Colorado residents in the Amazon Associates program, just like it did in Rhode Island and North Carolina. (A similar law in New York was challenged with a lawsuit. Presumably, Amazon would end its New York program if they lose the lawsuit.) Colorado lawmakers seemed surprised or dismissive of the program termination in their state, calling it a publicity stunt. Apparently, these legislators can’t be bothered to research the laws they are passing before they vote on them or they would have seen what happened in the other states that did the same thing.

One of the main issues many writers stumble upon when starting to make money online by writing is that the starter jobs almost always pay a low per article rate.  That isn’t necessarily a bad thing because you have to start somewhere.  However, if you don’t want to miss a mortgage payment, you’ll have to write those low per post rate articles fast, fast, fast!

Here are 4 Ways To Shorter More Profitable Writing

1) Leave Out the Exceptions – Every rule has an exception, but if you are writing a 300 word blog post, that is not the place to cover them.

2) Make Some Assumptions – Assume a certain level of common knowledge among your readers based on who you are writing for and start your article there.  Readers of an engineering blog already know about basic math, don’t cover it again.

3) Learn How to Write 300 Word Articles – Many websites have a 300 word minimum because SEO consultants and other search engine gurus tell them that posts between 300 words and 500 words are the best length for getting high search engine rankings.  So, learn to write good articles in just 300 words.  It’s faster than writing 700 words!

4) Stop Counting – Want to know why this list has 4 items?  Because that is how many popped into my head as I was writing.  That means I banged out this whole post faster than Boxer takes a dive in Vegas.  There is nothing magical about lists with 5 items, or a top 10 list.  Just because Letterman does a Top 10 every time, doesn’t mean you have to.

As you know, this blog is dedicated to helping you make money by writing online.  The updates haven’t come as fast as I had hoped, partly because I have been busy making money by writing online.  You see, my wife is pregnant and I’ve been trying to jam in as much writing working and other online freelance projects as possible before he gets here.

In the meantime, you might want to check out the latest article Top Webhosts For Writers at Arctic Llama.

You’ll need a good webhost in order to make money online by writing.  At first, you’ll need one just to host your writing business site.  Then, you’ll need to be able to host your money making sites.  Eventually, you’ll probably come up with a hundred other reasons to have a webhost.  For now, just trust me, you need one.

Article directories are those websites that allow you to post pretty much whatever you want, whenever you want, once you have signed up and had enough articles manually approved.  One such site is Associated Content and Ezine are two examples of such sites.

Typically, these sites do not pay anything up front, although they may offer you a payment based upon the traffic your articles receive.  As such, they are not necessarily good places to focus your money making efforts, but they can be a useful marketing and influence tool.

In order to make money writing online, you are eventually going to need to be able to show prospective clients that you can write, and write well.  Showing your writing abilities is typically done via writing samples.  In the offline world, writing samples are provided as printed copies, or perhaps via enclosed media such as a disk.  In the online world, writing samples are provided via links or email attachments.

To avoid filling their inbox with attachments that could contain viruses, be improperly formatted, or just flat out too time consuming to read, many online writing opportunities will ask you to supply links to your writing rather than sending attachments.  Obviously, articles published on your own website are a great source of writing samples, called clips, but article directories can provide a useful set of samples as well.

Since article directories allow you to publish on most any topic, you can build up an array of articles in the areas you are interested in writing about.  For example, if you are interested in writing about finance, you might publish articles on credit reports, mortgages, budgets, savings accounts and credit cards on a couple of different sites.  This provides two important advantages.  First, if someone glances at your writing samples and notices they are all from the same site, it is possible that they might draw the wrong conclusion and assume you only write for one site.  By having articles scattered around on multiple sites you can avoid this incorrect first impression.

Secondly, article directory sites provide you with a resource box or area where you get to include your information as a writer.  Inside of this box, you will provide a link back to your own website which will both provide potential traffic, and just as importantly, aid in your site’s search engine rankings by providing solid targeted links from another site.

Too much time can be spend publishing on article directory sites.  Even writers with many published articles don’t earn much money and those that do have published many, many articles, some over the course of multiple years.  While those writers may indeed draw high residual income from those articles, one can only wonder how much more money such a writer could have made putting the same amount of effort into building an online writing business from higher paying clientele who generate referrals and repeat writing project work.

So, if you are just starting out, or if you are in a slow spot in your money making venture, take the opportunity to publish an article or two on the article directory websites.  Then, go back to building up new contacts and improving your existing ones.

Make Money Writing Online Basics.

1. Write content for other webmasters or websites.
2. Write articles for article directories or article repositories.
3. Write articles for article distribution services and services that sell content.
4. Use affiliate program links in your articles.
5. Put ads on your websites and in your content.

• Top Website Advertising Program: Google AdSense
• Top Affiliate Program for Reviews and Product Recommendations:  Amazon Affiliates
• Top Article Database or Top Article Repository: eHow, Associated Content
• Top Websites to Write For – Large Writer Pool:  Bright Hub, Demand Studios

Top Make Money Writing Online Tip: Always write for cash, up front, payment only.  Only take revenue sharing, traffic share, or ad revenue sharing, as an add-on or bonus, never as the only means of payment.

If you want to write for free, write for eHow, Associated Content, or other article directories in order to get links back to your own sites.