About this Blog

I am tired of today's blogs and websites. No matter where you go, you have to click countless pop-ups away, simply to get to the content.

• You are asked to accept their privacy policy (which you must read carefully!).
• You are asked to subscribe their stunning Newsletter (no worries, they won't spam you!)
• You are asked for your e-mail address, so they can send you free stuff (don't miss out on this great offer!)
• You are asked if you want to allow notifications from them in your Browser (they only send notifications if it's important!)
• You are asked to disable your ad-blocker (they need to make money to stay alive!)
• You see ad-banners everywhere
• They track your mouse movements while you are on their site and as soon you move it up to the back button of your browser, they know it's their last chance to get your e-mail address. Another pop-up appears to enter your e-mail (please stay in touch!)

I think there are 2 reasons that led to this situation:

• Regulations: The GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) passed by the European Union in 2016 requires companies to obtain visitor's consent to collect any data from visitors. That's usually the first banner or pop-up you need to click away when visiting a website.
• Money: Millions of people are trying to make money with a website. Often, some products are sold and/or advertisements are displayed. If you read some tutorials about that, you will almost always read that it is crucial for your business to build up an e-mail List. This might be true to some extend, but I think not a lot people like those pop-ups asking for your e-mail address. It's just really annoying!

We can't do a lot against the regulations. We need to live with it. You must ask your website visitor for permission if you collect any kind of data.

It's completely understandable that someone with a blog wants to earn some money for the effort they put into it. But does the strategy to sell things really need to be that offensive? Do you really need to display multiple pop-ups to earn some money from the visitors? I don't know.

I don't know where this blog is going. I don't know what I will publish in feature. I want it to be an experiment.

My initial experiment is to do some affiliate marketing. I promote some products by writing reviews. I will earn a small commission if people end up buying the product. I want to find out if affiliate marketing without pop-ups, without e-mail marketing and without any other offensive strategy could work. I will write about my results after some time - come back to check it out!

If you have any questions, any recommendations or ideas, please contact me: simpleblogger@protonmail.com