Senin, 25 Juli 2011

Different Kinds Of Investments

These days, you can't retire without using the returns from investments. You can't count on your social security checks to cover your expenses when you retire. It's barely enough for people who are receiving it now to have food, shelter and utilities. That doesn't account for any care you may need or in the even that you need to take advantage of such funds much earlier in life. It is important to have your own financial plan. There are many kinds of investments you can make that will make your life much easier down the road.
The following are brief descriptions for beginning investors to familiarize themselves with different kinds of investment options:

401K Plans
The easiest and most popular kind of investment is a 401K plan. This is due to the fact that most jobs offer this savings program where the money can be automatically deducted from your payroll check and you never realize it is missing.

Life Insurance
Life Insurance policies are another kind of investment that is fairly popular. It is a way to ensure income for your family when you die. It allows you a sense of security and provides a valuable tax deduction.

Stocks
Stocks are a unique kind of investment because they allow you to take partial ownership in a company. Because of this, the returns are potentially bigger and they have a history of being a wise way to invest your money.

Bonds
A bond is basically a promise note from the government or a private company. You agree to give them a set amount of money as a loan and they keep it for a set number of years with a predetermined amount of interest. This is typically a safe bet and one that is a good investment for a first time investor because there is little risk of losing your money

Mutual Funds
Mutual funds are a kind of investment that are based on the gains and losses of a shareholder. Basically one person manages the money of several or many investors and invests in a list of various stocks to lessen the effect of any losses that may occur.

Money Market Funds
A good short-term investment is a Money Market Fund. With this kind of investment you can earn interest as an independent shareholder.

Annuities
If you are interested in tax-deferred income, then annuities may be the right kind of investment for you. This is an agreement between you and the insurer. It works to produce income for you and protect your earning potential.

Brokered Certificates of Deposit (CDs)
CDs are a kind of investment where you deposit money for a set amount of time. The good thing about CDs is that you can take the money out at any time without paying a penalty fee. We all know life isn't predictable, so this is a nice feature to have in your option.

Real Estate
Real Estate is a tangible kind of investment. It includes your land and anything permanently attached to your piece of property. This may include your home, rental properties, your company or empty pieces of land. Real estate is typically a smart and can make you a lot of money over time

Rabu, 20 Juli 2011

How to Achieve Currency Trading Success: Part 1

Currency trading success can be achieved by anyone, as everything about trading currencies can be specifically learned, by any trader wishing to put it in the time and effort to do so.
Trading currencies successfully is a combination of two factors:
Firstly, you need a successful trading method for long term currency trading success to predict market direction and these systems fall into two categories:
1. Fundamental analysis
A currency trader who makes trades based upon fundamental analysis, will look at the supply and demand situation relevant to the particular currency studied, and try and predict the impact of such factors as:
· The health of the economy
· Interest rates
· Balance of payments
· Employment
· Trade deficit
· Other factors
In today's markets with the all-fundamental information available in seconds anywhere in the world, fundamental news is quickly reflected in the price.
Traders therefore, can have difficulty acting quickly enough to position themselves in the market in relation to breaking news.
In light of this, more traders looking for currency trading success are using a technical approach to the markets.
2. Technical analysis
Technical analysis is the study of a currency, based strictly on using only the price history of the currency.
Technical analysis uses no information about the currencies supply and demand situation - it simply focuses on price action.
The common belief is that the currency price reflects all the known information about the currency as it is immediately discounted in price action.
Technical analysis however does something more - it indirectly studies human psychology.
Since price patterns reflect shifts in human psychology, one can assume that certain patterns, cycles and trends, will repeat themselves again, as human nature has remained constant over time.
Technical analysis takes into account both the fundamentals and the market participants psychology and this gives us a simple equation:
All known fundamentals + human psychology = Price action

The fundamentalist studies the cause of market movement, while the technician studies the effect.
For currency trading success, you need to catch the longer-term trends that yield the big profits. The technical trader does not care how and why these trends develop; all they want to do is make money from them when they occur.
Look at any currency price chart over time and you will see long-term trends and many of them last for years.
The secret of currency trading success is using technical analysis to spot them.

Long Term or Short Term Trading
For long term currency-trading success, is it better to be a long term trader, rather than a short-term trader.
While traders can, and do make money with short-term methods of trading, the fact is, currencies trend longer term and these are the trends that yield the biggest profits.
The reason for this is obvious:
Currencies reflect the underlying health of the economy.
These cycles of expansion and contraction, tend to last for many months or even years and a long term position trader has huge profit potential, if they can lock into and hold these longer term trends.
The choice between long term, and short term trading is subjective, but generally the longer-term price trends tend to be easier to predict, and offer better risk / reward, so a long-term approach is the one to focus on.

Minggu, 10 Juli 2011

FOREX dalam hukum ISLAM

بســـــــماللهالرحمنالرحيـــــــم
Dalam bukunya Prof. Drs. Masjfuk Zuhdi yang berjudul MASAIL FIQHIYAH; Kapita Selecta Hukum Islam, diperoleh bahwa Forex (Perdagangan Valas) diperbolehkan dalam hukum islam. Perdagangan valuta asing timbul karena adanya perdagangan barang-barang kebutuhan/komoditi antar negara yang bersifat internasional. Perdagangan (Ekspor-Impor) ini tentu memerlukan alat bayar yaitu UANG yang masing-masing negara mempunyai ketentuan sendiri dan berbeda satu sama lainnya sesuai dengan penawaran dan permintaan diantara negara-negara tersebut sehingga timbul PERBANDINGAN NILAI MATA UANG antar negara.
Perbandingan nilai mata uang antar negara terkumpul dalam suatu BURSA atau PASAR yang bersifat internasional dan terikat dalam suatu kesepakatan bersama yang saling menguntungkan. Nilai mata uang suatu negara dengan negara lainnya ini berubah (berfluktuasi) setiap saat sesuai volume permintaan dan penawarannya. Adanya permintaan dan penawaran inilah yang menimbulkan transaksi mata uang. Yang secara nyata hanyalah tukar-menukar mata uang yang berbeda nilai.

TRANSAKSI VALAS dalam HUKUM ISLAM
1. Ada Ijab-Qobul: ---> Ada perjanjian untuk memberi dan menerima • Penjual menyerahkan barang dan pembeli membayar tunai. • Ijab-Qobulnya dilakukan dengan lisan, tulisan dan utusan. • Pembeli dan penjual mempunyai wewenang penuh melaksanakan dan melakukan tindakan-tindakan hukum (dewasa dan berpikiran sehat)
2. Memenuhi syarat menjadi objek transaksi jual-beli yaitu: • Suci barangnya (bukan najis) • Dapat dimanfaatkan • Dapat diserahterimakan • Jelas barang dan harganya • Dijual (dibeli) oleh pemiliknya sendiri atau kuasanya atas izin pemiliknya • Barang sudah berada ditangannya jika barangnya diperoleh dengan imbalan. Perlu ditambahkan pendapat Muhammad Isa, bahwa jual beli saham itu diperbolehkan dalam agama.
لاتشترواالسمكفیالماءفاءنهغرد
"Jangan kamu membeli ikan dalam air, karena sesungguhnya jual beli yang demikian itu mengandung penipuan". (Hadis Ahmad bin Hambal dan Al Baihaqi dari Ibnu Mas'ud)
Jual beli barang yang tidak di tempat transaksi diperbolehkan dengan syarat harus diterangkan sifat-sifatnya atau ciri-cirinya. Kemudian jika barang sesuai dengan keterangan penjual, maka sahlah jual belinya. Tetapi jika tidak sesuai maka pembeli mempunyai hak khiyar, artinya boleh meneruskan atau membatalkan jual belinya. Hal ini sesuai dengan hadis Nabi riwayat Al Daraquthni dari Abu Hurairah:
منسترئشيتالميرهفلهالخيارإذاراه
Barang siapa yang membeli sesuatu yang ia tidak melihatnya, maka ia berhak khiyar jika ia telah melihatnya".
Jual beli hasil tanam yang masih terpendam, seperti ketela, kentang, bawang dan sebagainya juga diperbolehkan, asal diberi contohnya, karena akan mengalami kesulitan atau kerugian jika harus mengeluarkan semua hasil tanaman yang terpendam untuk dijual.
Hal ini sesuai dengan kaidah hukum Islam:
المشقةتجلبالتيسر
Kesulitan itu menarik kemudahan. Demikian juga jual beli barang-barang yang telah terbungkus/tertutup, seperti makanan kalengan, LPG, dan sebagainya, asalkam diberi label yang menerangkan isinya. Vide Sabiq, op. cit. hal. 135. Mengenai teks kaidah hukum Islam tersebut di atas, vide Al Suyuthi, Al Ashbah wa al Nadzair, Mesir, Mustafa Muhammad, 1936 hal. 55.

JUAL BELI VALUTA ASING DAN SAHAM
Yang dimaksud dengan valuta asing adalah mata uang luar negeri seperi dolar Amerika, poundsterling Inggris, ringgit Malaysia dan sebagainya. Apabila antara negara terjadi perdagangan internasional maka tiap negara membutuhkan valuta asing untuk alat bayar luar negeri yang dalam dunia perdagangan disebut devisa. Misalnya eksportir Indonesia akan memperoleh devisa dari hasil ekspornya, sebaliknya importir Indonesia memerlukan devisa untuk mengimpor dari luar negeri.
Dengan demikian akan timbul penawaran dan perminataan di bursa valuta asing. setiap negara berwenang penuh menetapkan kurs uangnya masing-masing (kurs adalah perbandingan nilai uangnya terhadap mata uang asing) misalnya 1 dolar Amerika = Rp. 12.000. Namun kurs uang atau perbandingan nilai tukar setiap saat bisa berubah-ubah, tergantung pada kekuatan ekonomi negara masing-masing. Pencatatan kurs uang dan transaksi jual beli valuta asing diselenggarakan di Bursa Valuta Asing (A. W. J. Tupanno, et. al. Ekonomi dan Koperasi, Jakarta, Depdikbud 1982, hal 76-77)

FATWA MUI TENTANG PERDAGANGAN VALAS
Fatwa Dewan Syari'ah Nasional Majelis Ulama Indonesia no: 28/DSN-MUI/III/2002, tentang Jual Beli Mata Uang (Al-Sharf).
MENIMBANG :
a. Bahwa dalam sejumlah kegiatan untuk memenuhi berbagai keperluan, seringkali diperlukan transaksi jual-beli mata uang (al-sharf), baik antar mata uang sejenis maupun antar mata uang berlainan jenis.
b. Bahwa dalam 'urf tijari (tradisi perdagangan) transaksi jual beli mata uang dikenal beberapa bentuk transaksi yang status hukumnya dalam pandang ajaran Islam berbeda antara satu bentuk dengan bentuk lain.
c. Bahwa agar kegiatan transaksi tersebut dilakukan sesuai dengan ajaran Islam, DSN memandang perlu menetapkan fatwa tentang al-Sharf untuk dijadikan pedoman.
MENGINGAT :
" Firman Allah, QS. Al-Baqarah[2]:275: "...Dan Allah telah menghalalkan jual beli dan mengharamkan riba..."
" Hadis nabi riwayat al-Baihaqi dan Ibnu Majah dari Abu Sa'id al-Khudri:Rasulullah SAW bersabda, 'Sesungguhnya jual beli itu hanya boleh dilakukan atas dasar kerelaan (antara kedua belah pihak)' (HR. al-baihaqi dan Ibnu Majah, dan dinilai shahih oleh Ibnu Hibban).
" Hadis Nabi Riwayat Muslim, Abu Daud, Tirmidzi, Nasa'i, dan Ibn Majah, dengan teks Muslim dari 'Ubadah bin Shamit, Nabi s.a.w bersabda: "(Juallah) emas dengan emas, perak dengan perak, gandum dengan gandum, sya'ir dengan sya'ir, kurma dengan kurma, dan garam dengan garam (denga syarat harus) sama dan sejenis serta secara tunai. Jika jenisnya berbeda, juallah sekehendakmu jika dilakukan secara tunai.".
" Hadis Nabi riwayat Muslim, Tirmidzi, Nasa'i, Abu Daud, Ibnu Majah, dan Ahmad, dari Umar bin Khattab, Nabi s.a.w bersabda: "(Jual-beli) emas dengan perak adalah riba kecuali (dilakukan) secara tunai."..
" Hadis Nabi riwayat Muslim dari Abu Sa'id al-Khudri, Nabi s.a.w bersabda: Janganlah kamu menjual emas dengan emas kecuali sama (nilainya) dan janganlah menambahkan sebagian atas sebagian yang lain; janganlah menjual perak dengan perak kecuali sama (nilainya) dan janganlah menambahkan sebagaian atas sebagian yang lain; dan janganlah menjual emas dan perak tersebut yang tidak tunai dengan yang tunai.
" Hadis Nabi riwayat Muslim dari Bara' bin 'Azib dan Zaid bin Arqam : Rasulullah saw melarang menjual perak dengan emas secara piutang (tidak tunai).
" Hadis Nabi riwayat Tirmidzi dari Amr bin Auf: "Perjanjian dapat dilakukan di antara kaum muslimin, kecuali perjanjian yang mengharamkan yang halal atau menghalalkan yang haram; dan kaum muslimin terikat dengan syarat-syarat mereka kecuali syarat yang mengharamkan yang halal atau menghalalkan yang haram."
" Ijma. Ulama sepakat (ijma') bahwa akad al-sharf disyariatkan dengan syarat-syarat tertentu.
MEMPERHATIKAN:
1. Surat dari pimpinah Unit Usaha Syariah Bank BNI no. UUS/2/878
2. Pendapat peserta Rapat Pleno Dewan Syari'ah Nasional pada Hari Kamis, tanggal 14 Muharram 1423H/ 28 Maret 2002.
MEMUTUSKAN
Dewan Syari'ah Nasional Menetapkan : FATWA TENTANG JUAL BELI MATA UANG (AL-SHARF).
Pertama : Ketentuan Umum
Transaksi jual beli mata uang pada prinsipnya boleh dengan ketentuan sebagai berikut:
a.Tidak untuk spekulasi (untung-untungan).
b.Ada kebutuhan transaksi atau untuk berjaga-jaga (simpanan).
c.Apabila transaksi dilakukan terhadap mata uang sejenis maka nilainya harus sama dan secara tunai (at-taqabudh).
d.Apabila berlainan jenis maka harus dilakukan dengan nilai tukar (kurs) yang berlaku pada saat transaksi dan secara tunai.
Kedua : Jenis-jenis transaksi Valuta Asing
a.Transaksi SPOT, yaitu transaksi pembelian dan penjualan valuta asing untuk penyerahan pada saat itu (over the counter) atau penyelesaiannya paling lambat dalam jangka waktu dua hari. Hukumnya adalah boleh, karena dianggap tunai, sedangkan waktu dua hari dianggap sebagai proses penyelesaian yang tidak bisa dihindari dan merupakan transaksi internasional.
b.Transaksi FORWARD, yaitu transaksi pembelian dan penjualan valas yang nilainya ditetapkan pada saat sekarang dan diberlakukan untuk waktu yang akan datang, antara 2x24 jam sampai dengan satu tahun. Hukumnya adalah haram, karena harga yang digunakan adalah harga yang diperjanjikan (muwa'adah) dan penyerahannya dilakukan di kemudian hari, padahal harga pada waktu penyerahan tersebut belum tentu sama dengan nilai yang disepakati, kecuali dilakukan dalam bentuk forward agreement untuk kebutuhan yang tidak dapat dihindari (lil hajah).
c.Transaksi SWAP yaitu suatu kontrak pembelian atau penjualan valas dengan harga spot yang dikombinasikan dengan pembelian antara penjualan valas yang sama dengan harga forward. Hukumnya haram, karena mengandung unsur maisir (spekulasi).
d.Transaksi OPTION yaitu kontrak untuk memperoleh hak dalam rangka membeli atau hak untuk menjual yang tidak harus dilakukan atas sejumlah unit valuta asing pada harga dan jangka waktu atau tanggal akhir tertentu. Hukumnya haram, karena mengandung unsur maisir (spekulasi).
Ketiga : Fatwa ini berlaku sejak tanggal ditetapkan, dengan ketentuan jika di kemudian hari ternyata terdapat kekeliruan, akan diubah dan disempurnakan sebagaimana mestinya.
Ditetapkan di : Jakarta
Tanggal : 14 Muharram 1423 H / 28 Maret 2002 M
DEWAN SYARI'AH NASIONAL MAJELIS ULAMA INDONESIA
========================================

Sabtu, 09 Juli 2011

10 ways to identify if your public relations company is right for you

PR plays a key function in a successful business. And for PR to be productive you will need to trust more than friendship or basic instincts in choosing an "ideal" PR company. Since public relations are about communication and steering the company towards realistic targets, you must consider a number or crucial and tangible issues.

Be clear that PR cannot be handled just by the firm it is a partnership between you and the PR experts. It is your inputs that will provide the PR firm with direction. You must on your side provide complete and updated information, be available to advice on or check material put together by the firm and spend time with the PR team on ideation. Only when the grounding is laid clearly will PR be successful.

1. The company must have worked for a business such as yours before or have at their fingertips the strategies they will employ to meet your PR objectives.

2. The PR firm must have updated its systems to include all the latest in media and communications.

3. The company must understand your business thoroughly and know in no uncertain terms how much strategic versus tactical support they can provide.

4. Determine whether the staff deployed for your project has both experience as well as expertise. Find out about their successes and failures.

5. Ascertain whether they can comfortably reach out to your target market and if they cab quantify their value

6. Study the proposals presented by them on your project and use your in depth knowledge of your business and the market to determine to what extent this will work.

7. A dedicated PR firm will not hesitate to disagree with you on any aspects of your plan they are not in agreement with. They know the ins and outs of their business and know what works and what does not.

8. The firm must not just have a series of meetings there should be constant interaction as well as reviews of work undertaken and subsequent results.

9. The contract must be clear and transparent with no hidden clauses. The PR firm must have a system where it clearly understands and then delineates in a contract its responsibilities.

10. Be sure to check their testimonials and credentials. Go through their case studies to determine their efficacy and do some research to find out their standing in the market.

The most apt definition of a PR relationship is that of the Counselors Academy of the Public Relations Society of America. It says, " a successful relationship between client and public relations firm or counselor has as a fundamental: a match of capabilities and needs, a 100% agreement on objectives, constant and instant accessibility, full information sharing, interaction at all levels, regular updates as well as progress review, and a clear contractual agreement."

Selasa, 05 Juli 2011

Fishing Tips For Beginners

There are many kinds of fishing equipments in stores, numerous fishing methods in books, and fishing advices online. To make it all simple, here are the basic things you need to know for your first time fishing adventure.

1) How to fish with bait

* Tackle. To plunk the bait, you should purchase lead weights. The weight of the lead would vary depending on the current of the environment. Anglers commonly use and recommend bank sinkers with a number-two hook.

To avoid sinkers to slide, you would need a swivel to act as a stop. To protect the knot, you could use plastic beads between the swivel and weight. Using two appropriate swivels could allow you to rig the sliding sinkers.

* Bait. The commonly used bait for all kinds of fishes is worms. Another popular bait is chicken liver. Remember to buy fresh bait and keep them cold to avoid them from getting soft and allowing the bait to stay within your hooks.

Some of the commonly used baits are cut-baits which include skin from fried chicken, fish entrails, grasshoppers, salmon eggs, shrimps and crayfish tails.

2) How to fish – There are three basic methods for fishing.

* Plunking – It is the most common method used. Use a suitable amount of weight for you to be able to take hold of the bait in a position which is against any current. An option in plunking is to use minimal weight for the bait to move along with the water current.

Back bouncing – It is done by lifting the bait out the bottom and raising the tip of the rod for one to two feet. Allowing the bait to walk with the current, you should free the back reel or spool. Repeat the steps when the lure settles down on the bottom. Back bouncing is effective in deeper water like fishing in a boat.

* Drift-fishing – It is a simple method wherein you cast upstream or downstream. This may vary depending on the current's amount. You should count the appropriate depth and start reeling.

3) How to fish from a boat – It is important to determine in which location you would perform your fishing. Deeper water needs heavier jigheads compared when fishing on shore.

* With heavy weight which keeps your bait near the bottom of the water and the line straight down from your boat, you are able to drift the boat along with any current. A good technique of fishing on boats is trolling slowly with a fishing device called bottom-walker.

Fishing is easy as long as you're enjoying the trip. Bring some of your family and friends along and make your first time fishing a memorable one.

Sabtu, 02 Juli 2011

10 Best Tips to Write Effective Emails

Hello Reader,

Nowadays, we communicate more and more through email. We use Email communication to write something to friends, relatives, colleagues or clients. Whoever the recipient of your email, it is becoming very important that you write email effectively. As you know, by writing effective email, you can save your time, other person's time and you can win more trust & confidence from the other end.

Give Reply of Email As soon as Possible

More and more people contact each other through email. Even if they mention directly or not, they expect prompt responses. One of the study by Jupiter Research indicates that 35% of customers expect a reply within six hours, an additional 55% expect a response within 24 hours. Though many people focus on response time, content is just as important. The same study indicated that lack of a thorough response (45%) will cause on-line customers to view a company negatively when considering future purchases.

Learn the art of writing Email

Poorly crafted emails will generate additional emails back & forth, which potentially eating up more of your time. Worse, they can drive unnecessary calls to your most costly channel – your phone. And at that point, customers are bound to be angry and frustrated.

Here are some tips for writing email responses that are both thorough and appropriate:

1. Format your response so that it's easy to read on a screen. Do not write email using very long sentences, which are lengthy horizontally. Each line must be short. Ideally, write 5-6 words in each line only and not more than that.

2. Make sure the subject line is concise and meaningful to the recipient…not just a generic
"Response from Marketing Team" But also be careful that it doesn't look like spam.

3. Have one subject per paragraph. Mention this separately by blank lines, so that its easy to read and understand.

4. Be brief. Use as few words as possible to convey your message. More is not better when
it comes to email. An email is not perceived as an electronic letter.

5. Use simple, declarative sentences. Write for a third or fourth grade audience,
particularly if you're creating templates that are sent automatically. You do not know the
education level of your sender or the sender's level of comfort with the English language.

6. Be sensitive to the tone of the original email. If the sender is upset because of an error on
your part, acknowledge the error. Clearly state what you are doing to correct the situation.

7. Make sure you answer all the questions posed in the original inquiry. A partial answer
frustrates the sender and results in additional contacts. It also makes the company sending
the response look inept.

8. Make it clear what actions you will be taking next and when the writer can expect the
next contact from you.


9. Don't ask for an order number/case number or any old information which you remember out of your mind only when one is included in the original email…sounds pretty basic, but sometimes people miss very obvious info in email.

10. Don't just tell the sender to go to your web site. In many cases, they have already been to
the web site and couldn't find the answers they were looking for. If you want them to go
back to the web site, provide a direct link to the exact information the reader needs.
For more information visit on: http://www.infotrex.com

Blogging - Developing A Readership

You've finally created a blog and you've made your first post. Now how do you get people to actually read what you're blogging about?

Here are some tips on promoting your blog.

1) Quality Content - Interesting content will keep your readership returning. Update your blog regularly.

Googlebot, which is Google's web-crawling robot loves content. The more you update your blog, the more frequent the search engine spiders will return to it.

2) Take part in forums that are related to blogging. Ask other bloggers for their opinion on your blog and take their suggestions to heart.

Ask other bloggers for their opinion on your blog and take their suggestions to heart.

3) Publish an RSS/Atom/XML feed. If you're using Blogger, you can turn on RSS feed by clicking on settings in your dashboard and then clicking on site feed and make sure that your settings are set to yes.

4) Carefully choose your subject titles, taking into consideration what other internet users may be searching for.

Use keywords in your title. I suggest subscribing to Word Tracker. Their report of the most popular searches is published each Tuesday and distributed to over 30,000 subscribers.

Technorati.com , is a blog search engine that also lists the top search words. The more targeted your keywords are, the greater your return in search engines will be.

5) Involve yourself in commenting on other blogs. You can gain a loyal readership just by offering feedback to your fellow bloggers. The comment feature allows you to add a link back to your blog as well.

6) Be sure to include your blog address in forum signatures and in your email signature.

7) Submit your blog to directories.

Submit your blog's url to Technorati, Daypop, Blogdex and Popdex.

8) Write articles. Include a resource box in your article and submit it to article directories such as http://iSnare.com

9) If you're using blogging software such as Blogger, there is an option to notify the central blog update services (such as http://weblogs.com) whenever you've made a new entry to your blog. Make sure that this option is turned on! In blogger, click on publish in your dashboard and make sure that your settings are set to yes under notify weblogs. Alternatively, you can go to http://ping-o-matic.com and send out a ping each time you update your blog. This lets everyone know that you've just updated your blog.

10) Link to other blogs. Use services like blogrolling, which is similar to linking. Blogrolling allows you to maintain an updated list of your favorite blogs. But, don't build a long blog roll of sites that you have no intention of returning to. There is nothing more annoying then visiting a blog that has a humongous blogroll.

Be patient, traffic doesn't happen overnight. The best way that I've found to increase traffic is by getting to know people. Spend what free time that you have, reading blogs, leaving feedback and building friendships. Try to leave comments on the blogs that you visit as often as you can. While you are waiting for the traffic to come, just enjoy blogging. You'll be improving your writing in the process.

Eventually you'll build a network of not just readers, but friends and loyal supporters. Blogging is not just about marketing; it's about creating lasting relationships.