I have taken a bit of a sabbatical this week from my blog, but have been super busy in the background with work, the school website, taxes, and other fun things. To help tide you over I have collected an assortment of blog posts, tutorials, and podcasts that I find interesting and may be helpful to you.

• Eric Nagel posted a very helpful and detailed set of posts this week on using a merchant datafeed to build an affiliate site.  It is complete with the code that you need and step by step instructions. I got to meet Eric at Affiliate Summit this year, where he handed me a scratch & sniff business card scented like coffee. We got to share our mutual love for Tim Horton, which only a select few of us in the States get to enjoy. Anyway you can find his datafeed posts here: Step 1, Step 1b, Step 2, Step 3, and Custom Categories. Thank you so much for this Eric, very helpful!
• Lynn Terry of Clicknewz suggests a new way to choose a niche that will have you thinking outside the box and dreaming big. It is definitely a fun possibility and very doable. Her website has great advice and goes way back, so you can easily spend hours visiting there. She also has a very active forum with a private membership/coaching option that you can join as well.
• I’ve taken to listening to podcasts lately. Some of my favorite this week were from Both Sides of the Tracks with Jason Rubacky and Eric Nagel. It gives a perspective on the affiliate marketing industry from both an affiliate and a manager. This week they did a show on the basics of SEO and the affiliate ad tax fight.  Shawn Collins and Lisa Picarille team up for Affiliate Thing and they talked about the latest news in the affiliate marketing world for the week.
• Randa Clay has created a new website to help people with solutions for WordPress. It was born out of her frustration with bookmarking tips and ideas she found and then not being able to find them again. Now she can store them all in one place and help others out at the same time.
• The weather has been so nice in Michigan this past week and has me looking forward to Spring. Yay! Here is a fun roundup of family friendly ideas to help celebrate the nice weather.

I hope that you are having a great weekend. I always enjoy this time with my family (even though I am sneaking in a bit of work here). I will be back up to sharing new ideas with you next week.