Weekly Top 5 Personal Finance Articles

Sunday already! Busy week for me as I had to catch up from recent business travel. Lots of great things were floating in the Blogsphere about personal finance, budgeting and money management.

Here are my Top 5 Articles of the Week:

• Dividends4Life - A great SET of articles about pre-screening dividend stock that show some of the tools he uses to run true comparisons. MUST reads for anyone looking at individual Stocks
• The Skilled Investor - They not only ran the most recent Carnival of Financial Planning but also just ran a great piece about choosing, hiring and paying for a financial adviser and what you should expect in return.
• Green Panda Treehouse - Another double-dipper. They ran a great Carnival of Personal Finance and also had a great article talking about how they pay their bills and work their budget process. I love that sort of insight as I always learn something new!
• Catherine Lawson's Business Advice Blog - I love all of her posts (and comments!) but 107 Great Resources to Unleash the Entreprenuer in You is really uber-impressive. My hand cramped on my 39-tips...she did 107!!!
• The Digerati Life - 7 Things to Consider as a First-Time Real Estate Investor was a great read, talking about the cyclical nature of the markets, but how real estate is still a great investment

Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Liberty News:

• Reached 20 Subscribers! Thank you! It is so easy to sign-up and for me, since I read a lot of blogs, it really is the best way to sign up. Just click on the rotating headline!
• Reached 1500+ Visitors! Thanks Again for reading it is very much appreciated!
• Reached 5000+ Page Views!
• I am really liking BlogRush... I have had over 15,000 widget views for my brand and about 30% of my posts reaching "Hot" status. Sign-up to today if you want more traffic...Just click on the bottom of my Widget! You get bonus view credits while you are building your blog and I get credits for signing you up!

Happy Personal Finance, Budgeting and Money Management reading!

Personal Finance QuickTake: Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Money Update

Gonna take one day off of our Personal Finance:QuikTake feature because today is a special day. Yesterday was the first month Anniversary of this Blog! It really has been amazing. To be able to share tips on Personal Finance, Money Management, Debt reduction and random acts of silliness has really help me focus on our finances and be more accountable.

There is so much great information out there and what started off as being curious about Blogging has turned out to be my new favorite hobby. It has been fun to tweak the look and feel of the site and to try and see if those tweaks translate to more visitors.

We have also achieved some mile stones over the last 90 days that I am proud of:

• 1000+ visits - I know some of your get this in a day, but I never though that many folks would come!
• Nearly 4000 page views - Wow!
• This is the 60th post! - Time has flown by!
• Great Comments - More Please! Thanks to CathL, Mrs M and Heidi (aka Bankergirl) for being the top commentators!
• Featured in many great Carnivals - This really has brought a lot of traffic, especially Plonkee's Current one and Mrs. M's recent Carnivals
• Featured on MSNMoney - The Micheal Scott piece has receive the most views so far of any piece, but the piece on your career is close!
• Great Blogs I didn't know about - "Good Karma list" started with 3 and now at 25 and growing fast!
• Supportive people - People have been very kind by giving the blog a chance to find it's voice and
• Starting to learn about AdSense and Affiliate Sales - It is really cool to see what works and what doesn't!

For anyone starting out I would say the following:

• Stick with it. Good content will attract readers
• Get good tools to help you - Blogger and Wordpress are great for the beginner! I got my site up in an afternoon
• Sign-up for Blog Rush - They are great about exposing your blog to a lot of people, and their bonus program help out new blog get extra exposure! IF you click on the tab on the widget on my blog you can sign up right away and, unlike other "traffic" helpers., it is free. If you sign-up through my widget I get extra bonus credits as well, and you will if other sign up on yours.
• Don't make a MFA (Made For AdSense Site) - Those Internet "deals" are scams and Google is cracking down. if you are doing this for big money, a part-time job will earn you more. You have to enjoy it. Not saying you can't eventually make some money, but it takes time and effort, no get rich quick here!
• Read about being an effective Blogger - ShoeMoney is a favorite. He gives you real facts, doesn't try to sell you anything and has great real-life tips.

Top 10 Traffic Buddy's for first 1000 visits!! - A Huge Thanks to them!!!

1. Mrs Micah
2. The Digerati Life
3. We're In Debt
4. Plonkee
5. Bankergirl
6. My Open Wallet - (First PF blog I ever read!)
7. Get Rich Slowly
8. Being Frugal
9. The Brightside of Debt
10. Collecting My Cash

Writing about helping people with finances, money and debt has helped my very much. I hope you have enjoyed some of the articles. If so please sign-up for my RSS feed, I try to update a couple times a day so it makes it easier to keep up! also if you enjoy the site and have your own blog please feel free to add me to your blog role too!

All the Best,

RacerX