Advertise or Not Advertise – That is the question
So, I was thinking about what our mom’s did to get through the day, their guilty pleasures.  One of the most notorious guilty pleasure for moms was the day-time drama, the ‘soap opera.’  Manufacturers would broadcast ‘soap’ commercials during the drama because the cores demographic of viewers were stay-at-home moms.  They were the ones buying the soap, so hopefully the manufacturer could sway a new customer buy placing an ad.

Today, I think a guilty pleasure for moms is blogging.  I know for me it is a great way to get new ideas, read some interesting stories, and stay in touch.  It's no wonder that Google is making a big push for their google AdSense widget.  There is a captive audience that can be connected with online advertising.

If you feel your blog can add value to its readers, you could potentially make money from all of your efforts.  You are spending time researching a topic, performing a project, and then reporting the results to your readers.  Any income you make will most likely go back into the blog.  It will be a ‘slush’ fund to finance more projects and more writing.

If you think about it, an advertisement on a blog may get more attention than the national TV add campaign (since everyone has DVR or TIVO) magazine ad, or billboard.

How does Google AdSense work?
You sign up for an AdSense account.  Google places relevant ads pertaining to the website content.  Google tracks the traffic and advertisement 'clicks.'

SECURITY TIP:  Don’t put personal information on your blog. Such as:
E-mail
Address
Birthdays
Social Security number*
Credit Card number*

*Do I really need to say this?!  I guess it’s worth mentioning.  Some people are clueless

Before you sign up for AdSense, Check the following:
1)    Is your blog ‘open’?  If you have an invite-only blog, there really is no reason to add ads to your blog.
2)    What type of blog is it?  Is it a cooking, sewing, or weight loss blog?  The advertisement will work better if there is a specific purpose to your blog.

How to Sign Up for AdSense:

1. Get an AdSense account:Go to this link
2. Click on ‘sign up now’
3. On the sign-up form, enter the relevant information for your site.  You need to enter your mailing address and phone number.  This is important because once your site has collected 10$ you will receive a check and information from google to set up automated payments.  SO DON’T PUT IN A FAKE ADDRESS!!                                                                                                                                                                                 The rest of the form is pretty self-explanatory.  You are agreeing to their terms and conditions.  One of the main conditions is that you or anyone in your household cannot click on the ads, even if they are not at home.  This is considered fraud.  But friends and family can click away!
4. Create or use an existing google account.
5. Once you submit your application.  It will take 1 to 2 days to get an e-mail from google and an active AdSense account.

Add AdSense to Blog:
Blogger:

• Go to monetize tab.  Select the layout that you prefer.  Just so you know,  after doing some research the recommended layout IS the best layout to get the most clicks.  The recommended layout will have a square add after each post and a skyscraper add to the right. THAT’s IT!!
• If you want to modify your ad layout, go to your blogger layout and click on the ‘AdSense’ gadget.

Other Blogs:

• Log into your AdSense account.  Create an ad content.  Go through the wizard of creating and formatting a content ad, channel, and generate HTML.  Copy the HTML code.  Paste the HTML code into a 'custom HTML' widget.

Here is a demonstration video which is pretty good.