Bukisa

Welcome to the first (of many) blog post on how to make your content shine. It seems, there is always an evasive line between just content and great content (the one, people will pay you to get). So, how do we turn our content from just a text to an engaging read?

Let’s start from the basics:

A rule of thumb for making interesting and engaging content is always to ask yourself: “Would I read that?”

Title: The title you choose is one of the most important elements of the content. It needs to be something that can quickly captivate someone browsing through a list of articles, in addition to being completely relevant to the body of the post. Avoid unnecessary punctuation in titles when possible (i.e. commas, periods, etc.).

Category: Select the category and subcategory in which your content best fits. Unsure of the right one, or can’t narrow it down to a single subcategory? Put yourself in the reader’s shoes and think of the section you’d go to first to find an article like yours.

Short Summary: The short summary is essentially a description of your article that will be included in most places that your post is listed (i.e. within a Bukisa category, when posted on Facebook, etc.). Avoid using phrases such as “a story about” and “an article on” or “this poem.” Instead, explain briefly why your article is relevant and more interesting than another similar one.

The Article/How To Guide Itself: The article should be at least 200 words (maximum of 5,000), with about 70-100 words before any image or video is embedded. For formatting your article in various sections, consider the following format: Header, Image/Video, Image Source, text, repeat.

Refrain from putting any private details (e-mail/address/phone number) in the article’s body. First of all there is the Bio for that and if your article is well written the reader will go there anyway. Secondly, and more importantly, if you do, it leaves your personal information very much exposed for everyone to see and use, if they so wish.

Another common issue is inserting links. Is it good or bad? How many of them should be in an article. Again, the best policy to follow is to put yourself in the reader’s shoes. How many links would it be ok for you to see in an article you want to read? We would suggest limiting yourself to a couple of links at the bottom of your article. (This does not apply for source links).

Overall, make your content appealing by expressing your knowledge and opinions fluently, concisely and to the point. Make sure your reviews are unbiased, your guides are clear and helpful, and your articles are informative.

Appreciate your audience and trust us, they’ll be coming for more and in larger numbers.

Write On!

Max

Hey everyone,

We are happy to announce that you are now able to select between either Google AdSense & Chitika ads.

In order to do so, you must be logged and you will see a new menu option entitled “Affiliate Settings” under that menu you can setup your Chitka or AdSense information.

If you do not have a Chitika account you can sign up to one here.

We still recommend going with Google AdSense as your revenue source on Bukisa, but on the other hand we do understand that there is a group of our users that are unable to use AdSense, so we now offer this option to you all.

Please allow up to 2 hours before you see the ads running on your content due to caching restrictions we have in place.

Happy Publishing,

Simon

So, we know you have all been waiting for an update on an alternative option to Google Adsense API. And, well… it’s here!

Before we selected an alternative to AdSense, we made a list of requirements. After all, we weren’t simply going to choose just any advertising network. We wanted the best. Here’s what we looked for: An established advertising network that is actually reliable with good performance, an easy to use interface and a number of payment options (with a reasonable minimum). After spending the last few days reviewing a handful of network options, we found what we were looking for: Chitika.com.

Allowing each user to choose the way he or she wants to monetize their content is extremely important to us (and to you most of all). With our newest addition, users will now be able to choose from Google Adsense OR Chitika.com. For those of you who choose to monetize your content using Chitika, you will be required to sign up through their website. It’s an extremely easy process and requires a short amount of time.

Chitika’s ads appear in a rotation during 60% of your content’s total exposure time and 40% of the time will display our ads.

At the end of every month you’ll be paid directly by Chitika based on the previous month’s earnings (Net 30). Payments are sent after your account has earned at least $ 10.00 (USD) for PayPal payouts or $ 50.00 (USD) for checks.

Beginning the first week of January, Chitika will be made available for all of our users to make the most of. We’ll be back with another update soon on how to add Chitika to your articles.

Cheers,

Eyal & The Bukisa Team

It has been 4 days since we announced the big change to Bukisa. While we are delighted to have received an overwhelming amount of honest feedback from our users in the last few days, we are equally troubled by the amount of frustration some of you have expressed to us. After tossing and turning for the past three nights, we have come to realize that due to many of our users’ issues with Google Adsense API, not everyone is able to benefit from our new platform. And that’s not cool!

Over the next few days, we’re going to examine a few alternatives to Google Adsense API and you will able to choose whether you want to use Google Adsense API or with the chosen alternative. In addition, during next week we will optimize the Google ads running on Bukisa in order for you to be able to receive greater royalties from your content.

With all the changes being made, we realize that not all of them are going to work straight away. With that said, we ask you to please have patience with us, as we explore newer and better options for you. We have posted a blog post with frequent questions we have been receiving regarding the changes to the Bukisa platform. In addition, we will continue to write you as new changes/ideas/thoughts arise.

We want to hear from you.

Eyal & The Bukisa Team

P.S. As always, we encourage you to write us with any questions or thoughts and concerns.

If I haven’t added my AdSense account do I still earn revenues for my content ?

Yes, you continue to earn revenues on your content based on the Bukisa Index – but only until Jan 13th 2011.

How do I track my Bukisa earnings in my AdSense dashboard ?

In order to track your Bukisa earnings and impressions all you need to do is to create a new “URL channel” in your Google AdSense control panel.

Old panel:
Adsense setup => Channels => URL Channels => Click “+Add” and enter “www.bukisa.com”

New panel:
Performance Reports => URL Channels => Click “Add URLs to track” => Enter the url “www.bukisa.com” and click Add URLs

My AdSense account is banned or I can’t open an AdSense account in my country

We are researching adding an alternative to Google AdSense, we will have an official update about this in the next few days.

What about the earnings made by us so far? Is there any chances that we will be paid? I haven’t yet reached my threshold payout yet.

All earnings will be paid out by Feb 1st 2011 (as long as you have reached $0.5 the minimum PayPal transfer amount)

Is Google AdSense supported in India?

Yes, Google AdSense works fine for users that are based in India.

Hello,

Due to the problems from the last 3 days that some users have experienced, specifically problems with adding their AdSense account and incorrect AdSense impression counts for their content, we will be giving all users (even those that added AdSense) the Bukisa Index for the past 3 days in addition to the AdSense earnings they may have occurred. (For Sunday/Monday/Tuesday)

This will appear in your earnings reports in the next 48 hours.

In addition the problem with the stats on the “My Content” page and wrong order of content on the profile page will both be fixed by the end of today.

Simon

If you didn’t receive our email update you can read it here.

As you know, we pride ourselves in being very open and transparent with our community. This was one of the main reasons the Bukisa Index came to be, as we felt it was the best way for users to know exactly how much revenue share they will get (and without having to write about ‘expensive’ topics to make more money). It’s simple, really .. write great content, bring in readers and get paid for doing so.

That was the theory, at least. In practice, over the last 2+ years, the Bukisa Index has been declining, as the percentage of bad/fake traffic has been increasing … sometimes reaching as much as 30% of the entire traffic per day! We have even been forced to block access from certain countries to combat this.

Over the last year, our team has been spending an increasing amount of time on detecting these types of bad traffic, along with a growing number of spammer users. This has caused us to not be able to put as much focus as we’d like on our product and community, but instead play policeman all day long. This is definitely not what we had in mind when Bukisa started and it may only worsen as we continue to grow.

So we are very excited to be announcing our move to handling the complete Bukisa revenue share program via the Google AdSense API program.

This will allow us the freedom to focus on making Bukisa better for us all, the Bukisa Team and the Bukisa Community alike. It is our belief that you will be able to earn even more money for writing great and unique content on Bukisa with Google AdSense, Google AdSense is our top revenue stream on Bukisa and you even get to keep 60% of revenues paid directly to you by Google.

We will be following up with several blog posts in the upcoming days which will highlight the new features and guides for using Google AdSense on Bukisa.

In order to add your Google AdSense account or signup to Google AdSense, click here http://www.bukisa.com/myhome/adsense

As always, we are open to any feedback or questions you may have.

Simon

The Bukisa team is working hard to make Bukisa an even better place to be for our valued community members, including you. In 30 days, we will completely overhaul the current Bukisa Index system, replacing it entirely with the Google AdSense API. This means that you will use your own Google AdSense code to earn money from the advertisements placed within your content.

Here’s what you need to know about the transition to Google AdSense:

• You have 30 days to update your AdSense account in your settings (you can do that here). Those who do not add their Google AdSense account during the next 30 days will continue to earn according to the Bukisa Index of 3.22, but will not earn anything from their content following the finalization of the transition. (After Jan 13th 2011)
• Users that don’t have a Google AdSense account will be able to sign-up for one via our new system.
• At the end of 30 days (“transition period”), all accumulated earnings in your accounts will be paid out entirely, so long as it meets the minimum payout amount of $0.50 (PayPal mimimum transfer amount)
• We are making this transition so that you can manage your own AdSense and the earnings from it, taking more of the content publishing reins in your hands.
• The earnings you receive from your content on Bukisa will have no effect on the earnings of content elsewhere associated with your Google AdSense account.
• If you have any further questions about the new integration of your own Google AdSense code on Bukisa, please see our F.A.Q. page.
• The Bukisa Network referral system will be discontinued during this transition, as Google AdSense’s revenue share program does not support this.

Bukisa has another new addition and it’s one we know you’ll be as excited about as we are. New ‘How To’ guides will now be accepted for submission. They’re not just your average How To guides, but instead will include rich content from your favorite image and video websites to enhance your content.

What are you waiting for? Start your first How To guide on Bukisa today!

All the best and keep up the good work,

Simon & The Bukisa Team