For two years people have been asking me to recommend effective personal development products. I've been recommending books for quite a while and recently began doing more involved deals, such as with PhotoReading and Paraliminals. You can expect more of these arrangements in 2007.
The animated ads on the site are contractually obligated to be there -- that's the exchange for being able to offer a discount on those products for StevePavlina.com visitors. I think it's a fair trade, but I understand and accept that not everyone will agree. It takes extra work for the product publisher to offer and process a discount, and they want to be sure the product will get some decent exposure if they're going to go to the trouble. A one-time blog announcement isn't much incentive for a publisher to offer a special deal. Without the ads there would be no special discount for these products.
I only recommend products I use myself, strongly benefit from, and have good reason to believe will benefit others. That's unusual in this field, since many personal development experts recommend each other's products without even trying them.
Financial success is a fairly important part of personal development -- I don't think I'd be setting much of an example if I started a business and then bypassed genuine opportunities for boosting its revenue. If it bothers anyone that I generate income from my work, go ahead and be bothered -- what I do over the next few years will probably just upset you even more.
