Stand Out From The Crowd or Bust
The make money online niche has become extremely saturated over the past year. There are more blogs than ever trying to rank for the phrase “make money online,” despite little-to-no prior knowledge or without any original content. As a result, we are surrounded by a sea of similar blogs and it has become harder than ever to stand out.
One blog which has differentiated itself in the blogosphere is Cash Quests. Cash Quests describes itself as the “personification of online greed.” To put it simply, what makes Cash Quests stand out is a clever combination of juicy content, well-written opinion, and practical knowledge of how to make money online. Add a dash of humor and the guts to call out AGLOCO, and it is clear why Cash Quests is one of the most widely read blogs in the “make money online” niche.
Judging from this Alexa chart, it is clear that Cash Quests has enjoyed almost instantaneous success since its mid-May inception progressive success since it’s December 2006 inception.
Stop Being Everyone Else
Cash Quests is popular for many reasons. One aspect of Cash Quests’ popularity is that it is not like any other blog. Let me illustrate this point with several examples:
Calling out the big boys. The success of Cash Quests can be attributed to many factors. One aspect in particular is its stance on AGLOCO. While everyone was praising AGLOCO to no tomorrow, Cash Quests was calling it out for being too much like its predecessor, AllAdvantage, a company that was dead in the water after two years.
A few months later, CQ further proved its point in the article, “How Much Money Can You Make From AGLOCO? I Know!” Hats off to CQ for calling out a scheme. I never personally invested a single keystroke promoting it, but I know many others did.
The removal of comments. What is a blog without comments? Cash Quests did a study on the top 10 blogs on Technorati and found out that only 3% of readers leave comments. The conclusion that CQ drew was that “…comments do very little to add value to a site and that the main focus for a blogger should be on rewarding and encouraging readers – not just those who leave comments.”
After 7 days without comments, CQ shared its results. CQ noted one surprising change from turning off comments:
Better relationships will be built: Without having to spend time reading, moderating and replying to comments I predicted that I would have more time to spend e-mailing and building relationships with other bloggers. This has definitely occurred with some fantastic relationships being built that have resulted in some very high PR links being both given and received.
Did turning off comments have an effect on readership?
Interestingly enough, readership has only INCREASED on CQ! With over 800 RSS subscribers now, Cash Quests is one of the most popular blogs in its niche, and it’s no surprise with its consistently outside-the-box content.
All guest bloggers should die? I will admit – that post title is pure linkbait, but Cash Quests makes a strong argument for why guest bloggers do not provide value to blogging. To illustrate, CQ purposes this question:
Imagine you have just written a super-awesome post that will be linked to by everybody who reads it. Will you publish it on your own site or will you e-mail it away to be published here on CashQuests.com?
CQ says that we would rather save it for our own site, but I disagree. If I had the opportunity to post on a blog with as large of a readership as CQ, I would want to make sure it was some of my best content, not just B-work. Like anything, guest-blogging is an opportunity to surpass what people expect from you. If I wrote a crappy post for a guest blog, of course no one will want to visit my blog! A-work all the way for guest posts is what I say!
That being said, CQ follows up its argument about guest blogging with an interesting example taken from Shoemoney’s blog in a post entitled “Helping Shoemoney Make Money Online.” Like many of CQ’s posts, it is a hilarious read!
A plethora of hilarious, well-written, and insightful articles in to the world of making money online. A few superb examples:
- Did You Just Throw Up On Your Website? Get Color Smart!: CQ says, “Don’t just pick your favorite color – conduct psychological warfare and choose the color that will best reflect the theme of your site and lead to maximum revenue.”
- Incredible Website Reviews: One thing CQ excels in is website reviews. All of its reviews contain a 500-word minimum, multiple screenshots of your site, and multiple links to your site using any anchor text. For example, its recent review of Derek Beauchemin was a great insight into another clever online marketer.
Funny thing too is that CQ recently did a review of me. You, too, can have your site reviewed on CQ. At only $80, this is an excellent value for a website review with a readership as large as CQ’s, which is sure to grow bigger in the coming months. You can learn more about its website reviews here.
- Why You Only Need $10 To Become Remarkable. Excellent insight into the need to brand your identity and the surprisingly low cost of doing so. CQ says:
In my quest to make money online, I spend a lot of time reviewing and visiting new sites and it never ceases to amaze me at just how ugly some of them look. As visitors will be assessing your site within the first second of visiting it, it’s essential that you make a brilliant first impression!
Conclusion
If there is anything I try to preach on my blog, it is to stand out from the crowd however possible. This is something that CQ has done exceptionally well. Clever writing, juicy content, and strong opinions only make me want to read more of Cash Quests. I am sure we can expect CQ to easily crest 1000 readers before you know it.
Cash Quests is DEFINITELY one of the more interesting blogs to read today and I highly recommend everyone subscribe to CashQuests.
One last thing, it looks like CQ is about to unleash a new blog design! Currently, several spots are still available, but I am sure they will be going very fast. Your opportunity to advertise on an increasingly popular blog which is sure to receive far more more traffic in the future is limited. More information here…
