Making money on the internet is a never ending battle of (1) optimization, (2) writing, (3)link building and (3)time management. If you, like me, run more that one site then the last one is the most crucial as the writing, optimization, and link building need to fit in with your schedule. This is especially important if blogging is not your “career”.

This is where the process really comes into play. Everyone has their own style so everyone’s process will be different. The important thing is to understand how you are going to get the above 4 things done. Here is a overview of the process I go through:

Writing:

Set up Google Reader with a keyword search for each one of the topics I write about on sites such as Google News, various blogs I follow, and other sites. For example, on my The Running Guy blog I have a search for “running a marathon”. This way I can see topics for potential articles and for other people’s articles that I could comment on to help build links.

Optimization:

I try to do one thing per day on each site that helps me do some SEO optimization. Following my SEO Book as a guide for best practices, I pick one thing that I could do to improve my rankings. I know I have a long way to go but every small step counts.

Link Building:

Link building is all about getting links to your sites on as many quality sites as possible. I try to email one webmaster per day to request a reciprocal link. I also try to comment on other quality blogs and ensure my signature and link is included. One caveat on this is to ensure you are providing quality comments and not just 1 - 2 word comments that point to your site. You will not get any value out of this.

Time Management:

This is the toughest one - especially if you hold a full time job, a family, or whatever else that eats your time away. Add in writing, link building, SEO optimization and multiply this by 3 sites and you will quickly run out of time. Here is what I do:

1. Use my HTC S710 to do my writing, while I take the train to work. I can write an email to myself with the post and then quickly upload the post to the site when I get home.
2. I set up a calendar item for each day to remind myself of which blog I am to write to today. This focuses me on one post per day and provides some structure to ensure I post consistently.
3. Once the post is posted, only then do I focus on link building and SEO optimization. Posting consistently is more important than anything.

This process works for me, let me know what works for you.

Reminder: SEO Book is the standard in SEO optimization. It has worked for me and many more bloggers who are WAY more successful than I am.