A lot of the time, people think this type of post is a joke or a scam but it’s not. Ashley Morgan of Upstart Blogger is giving away a free MacBook Air. There’s no real trick to the promo, simply link to his contest (here) and you can win it.

Why would he give away a MacBook Air?

Actually he could have picked anything to give away but the MacBook Air is sexy, it’s sleek and it’s amazingly cool. It’s also a valuable giveaway which will attract far more interest than say a free pencil but I guess the real question is why … why would a successful blogger like Ashley give away something as valuable as a MacBook? Wouldn’t it cost him a lot?

Yes. Simply put, giving away a MacBook Air will cost him a lot but cost it seems is a funny thing. As long as he gets back more than he give out, is there really a cost? Need that explained a bit more?

The cost to Ashley is fixed, he’s giving away a MacBook Air which according to Apple has a cost of $1499.

Ashley is trading links from websites such as mine to his posting at http://www.upstartblogger.com/link-to-me-and-grab-a-free-macbook-air. Every time I link from my blog to Ashley’s blog it acts as a vote from my website (PageRank 5) to Ashley’s. This does two things:

1. First it reaffirms with Google that UpstartBlogger is a valuable contributor to the Internet which in turn increases his websites position in search engine result pages (SERP’s). This improves his position and ensures his blog appears higher in the results.
2. Secondly, it causes readers just like you to follow my links to his website and in turn be exposed to his advertising which in turn … increases his revenue.

In short, the offer is a calculated risk which all business people can learn from.

If AR+AS is greater than C, it’s not actually costing him anything. So, as long as AR (Advertising Revenue) plus AS (Advertising Savings) is greater than C (Cost) he’s going to make a profit through the placement of ads and the money he saves by not having to buy links to his website.