How and why I bot:
I am a casual botter.
I am a member of a what you might call a cutting edge guild. I have killed everything in the game that you can kill. My main and my alts got the gear thereafter.
I started botting because I realized that I wouldn't have time to get consumables etc to keep on endgame raiding when my IRL kicked in and I got a daughter. Now I bot because I am bored as f*ck with the game and I think its fun to setup the bots and make meshes/profiles and see em working. Of course it also covers the weekly repair/consumables costs.
I also love multiboxing the normal way and doing 5man HC's with bots have proven to be fun as well. I have no economic intrests in botting at all.
GOLD:
I use inscription/alchemy to make my gold, i make roughly 20-40k / week if/when I need to fill up. But remember, its just for my own use.
I use GB whenever its needed to restock. When I use GB I fire up 2 alts with epic flier and go mine/herb crazy for 48 hours or so.
I have alchemy on 10 chars with transmute mastery. Epic gems is the way to go, I got all gem recipes known to man on my main as well.
All herbs go into making glyphs. When I need cash I keep 5 glyphs of all glyphs that sells for more then 5g up on the AH at all time using the amazing eAuction plugin.
My AH activity is very .. spikey so to speak. I never undercut more then 1%.
Leveling:
When I lvl my bots I use my own profiles/meshes. They are all somewhat off the beaten path and I babysit em all the very first time I run em.
I keep a close watch on the profile section here to see that noone else makes profiles in the same area, if ppl do I change my own.
As soon as I am happy with the mesh/profile I normally let it run 24/7 until they hit their lvl (58/68/80).
A key to the profilemaking is to KNOW the area yourself and adjust your route thereafter (since I have played this game since the only playable faction was Alliance and SM was endgame I do know most areas of the game and where/how ppl level).
Since HB introduced RAF I have made all my profiles/meshes for grps of atleast 2, with alot of adds and grouped mobs.
I don't ever buy gear to my bots instead I let the autoequip plugin deal with that (but for the love of God change the values in the file).
I vendor pretty much everything they find up until +78 blues.
When they hit 20 I normally do one evening of Cath runs with my main to get them to 40.
I keep em in a guild to avoid all guildinvites and such.
I NEVER DO BG'S.
You will get reported in a BG because it is so bloody obvious that you are a bot.
Remember, whatever might be posted here on why/what makes ppl getting banned, that 99% of all bans are from playerreports.
Ppl can tell you that it is automatic banned due to AH usage, vendoring, not questing etc. Thats all BS. Just ignore it and bot away.
BUT DONT GET REPORTED.