I’m still alive and kicking, just in case anyone was wondering why there have been no new posts over the past 2 days. Yesterday I got the call from IBM to inform me that my ThinkPad was ready for pickup. So I made the arduous journey across the “wild west” streets of Bangkok to go and collect it.

IBM did a great job and the new screen is perfect, the only problem is that they formatted my hard drive. Why they did that when only replacing the screen is beyond me, but I was just happy to have my notebook back. So as soon as I got home I started restoring all my data. Luckily I keep extensive backups of everything so everything went pretty smooth.

Once I was back up and running, I decided to check my affiliate stats and I got the shock of my life. I had a great Google Adwords campaign running that was promoting a Credit giveaway offer, conversions were good, so I increased my Adwords spending limit. Unfortunately, the offer expired yesterday morning. So all those Adwords clicks were being sent to an offer that was no longer available. The end result, I am $513 in the red. That’s quite a big loss for me.

Well, I’ve learnt my lesson, I’ve got to read the fine print on all offers and set time limits on my campaigns from now on. If I had my notebook I probably would have caught it early and the losses would have been minimal. Do you think I could claim from IBM for this? I suppose that’s just wishing…

Being an Internet Loser, I’ve become quite familiar with Affiliate Program rejection letters. I get one practically every week. I must admit my heart sinks every time I get one, especially when I know the program would convert really well on one of my sites. It always feels like a stab to the heart.

You may be thinking that my sites don’t qualify for the programs and that would be my first thought too, but usually I am rejected simply on the basis of my location or nationality. 95% of my web site traffic is from US or European visitors, which is pretty much the Holy Grail of internet traffic to any Affiliate Program.

While I understand the reason for some rejections, usually involving local laws, some simply baffle my brain. As an example, I cannot apply to gambling programs as gambling is illegal in Thailand, but getting rejected for a travel program makes no sense at all.

Now, many successful Affiliate Marketers all recommend Commission Junction, www.cj.com, as the best place to find Affiliate Programs to promote. What do you do if 95% of the programs reject you as soon as you click the apply button?

I have applied to a few programs, most of which need you to call or fax them before they approve you and I’m hoping that I will not have to face another rejection letter this evening. Here holding thumbs that they think things through. Wish me luck…

Where would a blog about being a loser be without some proof about my lack of success. While browsing the net today, looking for ways to make money online (almost a full time job for me), I decided to check my AdSense earning and low and behold, there was a click, someone had clicked on one of my Ads. Yippee! Time to break out the party hats, fine champagne and grab my wife so that we can dance for joy at out new found fortune.

After the euphoria of the initial surprise started to wear off, I decided to look a little closer. Yes someone had clicked on an Ad, but it was worth absolutely nothing, not a cent, zero, naught or whatever you want to call it. I wonder how much Google made of that click… Talk about keeping 100% of the profit while I do the work.

I know we are near the middle of the month, so it’s either too early or too late to supply an income report, but I figured what the hell. I may as well celebrate this little victory and share it with all of you.

Total Income: $0
Total Expenses: $15

Total Profit: -$15

After just over a month of life, the blog has made $0 and cost me about $15, which gives me a net profit of -$15. All of a sudden that warm fuzzy feeling has left me and I’ve come crashing back to earth.