Announcing the Christian Book Lounge, Plus a Safe Way to Make Money on Your Blog

Christian Book Lounge

Get ready for a bunch of stuff … I thought I’d combine like five posts in one because they directly relate to each other.

FIRST, I’d like to officially announcing the Christian Book Lounge blog today.

Here’s the idea behind the Lounge, or what the Lounge is all about:

  1. It’s a way to discover good books (Christian or others)
  2. It’s a way to discuss good books (Christian or others)
  3. It’s a way for you to earn a couple of pennies. Using your Amazon Associates affiliate links to the books you review, you get credit for helping others discover good books.

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WHY I STARTED THE LOUNGE

  • I’m a book nerd and junkie. I love books. And since my wife and I are on a rapid student loan repayment plan, I can’t go buy a lot of books. The more I earn on Amazon, the more books I could potentially buy.
  • I just thought it might be a good idea. I also love finding good books. And I REALLY love the fact that others can help me find good books I haven’t heard of. Is that too simple of a reason?
  • It was cheap. I ponied up the money to put in the plumbing for this venture. But it was remarkably cheap! In fact, for less than the cost of a book I got the site going … and know that through my own Amazon affiliate links I’ll probably make it back in a month or so.
  • It’s a platform for others as well as myself. By providing the site, it helps me, but it helps others too like my seminary buddies Ariel and Micah, who have said they’re going to post reviews (after finals!). I like that. And whatever they write, they get credit for through their Amazon links.

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WRITE A BOOK REVIEW FOR THE LOUNGE …

Now …are you interested in writing a review or contributing to the Lounge?

Here’s two ways to contribute reviews:

Write your own book review right now with this handy online form. The downer though is doing it this way means I have to publish it …

So, the better (and easier) way is become a contributor … to do that, go register for an account … WordPress will notify me of your registration and I’ll upgrade your account to allow you to post reviews through WP. Pretty easy … you cut and paste your review into a post with your Amazon links and push “Publish.”

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HOW TO WRITE A GOOD BOOK REVIEW — A Simple Formula

Here’s what I’m looking for in terms of reviews that people will actually want to read (and want to buy your recommended books) … just some general suggestions:

  • Use the book title as your headline title and post slug
  • Introduce the book, author, and the topic in the first paragraph.
  • Keep it all simple and maybe to less than 500 words. (But you’re not limited to that.)
  • It doesn’t have to be a seminary-worthy book critique … in fact, take out your academic formality … just tell us about the book, how it impacted you and interact with the content … in other words, write it like you would tell me in person about it.
  • Include what you liked (or loved), what you disliked (or hated). Rate it too.
  • Tell us who should buy it. “I’d give this to my grandma because she loves inspirational stories.”
  • One of the best ways to give a short review is to talk about one chapter specifically.
  • Give practical takeaways. “On page 13, he talks about this great marketing idea, so I implemented it in my church and saw [number] of people fill out guest cards, etc.”
  • Add an appropriate category, like “leadership.”
  • Use the “Read more” shortcut button after your first paragraph. This helps for getting more titles on the home page.
  • Include two or three related books in bullet points form that people could check out (including your Amazon links in those as well)
  • After you write your post/reviews, do a quick edit before publishing.
  • At the bottom of the review include two links: one to your Amazon aStore and another short one to your blog site. (Stay away from shameless self-promotion please. Write good reviews, include your blog site at the end and people will click.)

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BLOGGING TIP: THE SAFEST WAY I KNOW TO MAKE MONEY ON YOUR BLOG

You mean you still want more tips after I just showed you a good way to review books?

OK, here’s another one … here’s the safest way I know how to make a couple of dollars off your blog site.

Get an Amazon Associates account and start linking to books you recommend on your blog sidebar.

Think about it: You’re linking specifically to books you recommend, that you think are actually worth someone reading! You’re not relying on AdSense or other contextual ads program to serve up random links (and possibly heretical links!) … you’re handpicking them yourself.
If you haven’t signed up for an account, go do that now. It’s free and welll worth your time.
This is especially handy for pastors. Why?

There’s a two-fold benefit.

  1. You get to recommend solid books for your congregation and others to read.
  2. You get to earn a commission of it that doesn’t change the price of the book!

Bonus: After you get your Amazon Accociates account, the first thing you should do is start an aStore [check out mine]. This is an INCREDIBLE way to earn commissions. They provide all the infrastructure including product reviews from others, similar books, etc. It’s just grand!

December 2, 2006 · Filed Under Blogging Tips, Church Marketing

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