A Few Odds and Ends
January 19th, 2010 by Clayton
Lots of cool things are happening these days!
This past Sunday, I met up with some internet marketers here in the Seattle area. It was really cool to actually meet people that are doing this. It makes me feel a little less crazy to actually be around people that talk about SEO, affiliate commission rates, and other topics that seem to make everyone else’s eyes glaze over. I even met one guy that makes a full-time living from an affiliate website. This was pretty huge for me. I’ve talked to people online that make lots of money doing this. I’ve even traded a few e-mails with some. But to actually meet someone that’s doing this in person… There was something especially motivating about that.
Tonight, I am going to start my first Japanese language class through the UW Experimental College. I took a year of Japanese in college when I was an undergrad, but I forgot most of it. Going to Tokyo in 2008, really made me want to learn Japanese so I could actually be a bilingual bad ass! Plus, I’ve decided to set up a Japanese language website (which I will refer to as website #7 from here on), and this will be a great opportunity to get content for it. All I need to do is go to class and learn something I want to learn anyway, then go home and write about what I learned to make an affiliate site. Pretty sweet if you ask me!
This week is kind of hard for me. My girlfriend is doing the Tim Ferriss Diet again. She is forbidding me from doing it this time because she’s afraid I’ll wither away to nothing. So, to help keep her motivated, I’m choosing to suffer as well, by only checking my Clickbank account on Fridays. I did not realize, how addicted I was to logging in and seeing if I’ve made any sales.
There are some other things going on this week too, but they are directly related to my online business (my newspaper ad, outsourcing, etc.), so I’ll save those for my Friday update. It’s times like now that I’m really excited to be alive!
Posted in Goals, Life, Online Income Experiment | Comments (2)
Website Building Update – Week 20
January 15th, 2010 by Clayton
This week has been pretty busy. I went ahead and pulled the trigger on outsourcing some article writing and spinning. I don’t know if it’s overkill, but I gave my guy a list of article titles and a short description of what the article should be about with a few relevant bullet points. It took me about a day to do all the keyword research and find topics to write about, but it should be more than worth it in the long run. I should get some articles back from him next week.
I’ve also been going back and polishing up the first four websites. I’ve made them FTC compliant and I’ve changed affiliate ads on products that haven’t been converting for new ones that will hopefully make some money. I redid the design of one site to make a little less ugly and I’ve also started adding new articles as well, which will ultimately mean more spinning down the road (ugh…).
At the recommendation of an Affilorama member, I’ve started doing some social bookmarking, which is very time consuming, even with something like Onlywire. I don’t want to be a spammer, so I have to hunt down other things to bookmark as well. Very dull work.
In an effort to generate some quick cash (so I don’t starve to death), I’ve taken out a small ad in a local newspaper which will direct people to an affiliate offer. The paper with my ad will be published next week.
It seems like juggling all these websites and promoting them is quickly getting out of control. I hope I start pulling in a significant amount of money soon so I can outsource more work.
So this week has been pretty good. A few sales have brought in over $130, which my working friends may snicker at, but I’m quite proud of it. It’s strange, my sales seem to be clumped on certain days. I’ll go a few days with nothing, then get 2 or 3 sales within a few hours of each other.
Have a good weekend, y’all!
Posted in Online Income Experiment | Comments (2)
Why Don’t You Get a Job?
January 12th, 2010 by Clayton
As someone who has decided to start their own business, I am met with constant criticisms from people in my life that just don’t understand things the way I do. These are the early days and I’m not making a great amount of money. Whenever I tell my mother about a small success I’ve had or a sale of a few dollars, she cynically asks me if I found that money on the sidewalk, as if my entire business was nothing more than looking for stray quarters that people drop on their way to work. My friend assumes that this is a passing phase and that I’ll soon regain my sanity and get a job. People are always giving me tips on some job they saw in a newspaper or on craigslist.
It’s frustrating and disheartening. It feels like the people in my life that I trust the most are betraying me and trying to pull me down.
So, why don’t I just get a job? The answer is two-fold:
First, the economy sucks. With the real unemployment rate around 17.5%, now is a very stupid time to go out looking for a job unless you are absolutely desperate. I have a masters degree in architecture, which makes me too “over educated” to get a job in any other field. With most of the major architecture firms laying off about half of their staff, my odds of actually landing a job in my field are even slimmer.
There are barely any jobs out there in architecture these days. The few job that there are are bombarded with so many resumes that the competition makes it almost an exercise in futility. Even if I could get a job, all it would mean is that I’m willing to do the most amount of work possible for the least amount of money. Not exactly the optimal position to be in. Why try to win a battle in a losing war?
Secondly, working for a living is a waste of time. Yes, you heard that right. If you’re here on my blog, you probably already believe this to some degree. Take me, making a few hundred dollars a month and any one of my friends out there with a full-time job making $40,000/year ($3,333/month), and it looks like I’m coming in the loser. But if both of us stopped working, I’d still be making a few hundred dollars every month, while their earnings immediately go to $0. Starts to change the way you think about things.
Add to that the fact that there really is no ceiling on how much I can make on my own. I can keep working and keep growing my income into the six- or seven-figure range if I keep at it long enough. While my full-time friend is stuck earning a solid $40k on salary if he works 40 hours this week or 80 hours. The only time he can get that bumped up is by crossing his fingers and praying that once a year, his boss will give him a one or two thousand dollar raise.
So, even though I’m not really making “big money” yet, I still think I’m in a better situation. I can keep my dignity by running my own business. I don’t have to go out and sell myself all over town the the lowest bidder in this dismal economy and I don’t have to trade my time for money.
So keep laughing at me. The joke is on you. You ask me if my money comes from finding nickles on the sidewalk, but you wake up at 4AM to “survive” another day and come home tired only to piss away your free time in front of the TV. You think I’m insane when you rent out your mind and body to someone else who can instantly decide to kick you to the curb and leave you with nothing. I’m out here creating my own opportunity, and I’m out here creating my own assets. One day I’ll be living the life and you’ll be left wondering how I did it still zoning out in front of the TV and renting your mind. See you then.
[end rant]
Posted in Life | Comments (10)
Website Building Update – Week 19
January 8th, 2010 by Clayton
I got a little cash for the holidays and I’m looking to put it to work for me by trying to outsource some work for a new website. I’m admittedly a little nervous about this since I’ve never done this before. Also, I’ve been so involved in the process of doing all the work that I am both anxious about giving it to someone else and worried that somehow there will be a miscommunication somewhere.
If nothing else, this is a great chance for me to do one of Tim Ferriss’ exercises from the 4 Hour Work Week and practice outsourcing and delegating things to other people. If this outsourcing stuff pays off, building these websites will get immensely easier. As dorky as it sounds, I fantasize about what it would be like to never spin another article again.
I took advantage of Sean Morrissy’s New Year’s offer to evaluate my business plan. He said it was pretty good, but I need to do more SEO. So I’m going to spend more time promoting my existing sites and try out some social bookmarking. I signed up for Onlywire, which I can use for free by putting their bookmarking button at the bottom of my blog posts here. I tried SocialMarker, but I found it to be time-consuming at best and non-operational at worst.
Also, I’m not really sure why, but it seems to be nearly impossible to open an account with Propeller. Has anyone else experienced this or found a work-around?
This year, I’m trying to reach out and meet other people in “the game,” hence contacting Sean. I also joined a local Meetup group here in Seattle for internet marketing. They are meeting next weekend. I’m excited to start meeting other people out there and hopefully learn a thing or two from them.
Anyway, this week was a pretty quiet week. Only one new sale since I last posted, which is strange since my hop clicks have gone up through the roof this past week. I’m beginning to think that my recent surge was a result of the holidays. Well, my sales still have a slow pulse, so I’m grateful, but I’d really like to get back to making sales nearly every day. I guess that’s a bit of a taste of things to come.
Till next week.
Posted in Online Income Experiment | Comments (3)
The Question
January 5th, 2010 by Clayton
So a few weeks ago, I was got an e-mail from super bad-ass internet marketer Frank Kern about this holiday DVD he was giving away for free as a way to give back to the community. I got it and watched it.
The DVD is a presentation he gave at some seminar. He details this exercise where you sit down and answer one question. You answer it in incredible, minute detail. Doing say has the power to change your life. What is this “magical” question?
It’s “What would you do on your perfect day?”
Go into insane detail on this exercise. Write about what you think about when you wake up in the morning. What do you have for breakfast? Where are you eating breakfast? What do you do with your time? What do you wear? How do your clothes feel against your body? Where do you live? Who do you spend your time with? What do you do when you spend your time with them? How does that make you feel? What are you working toward? What makes you happy?
You get the idea.
Frank spent about 4 hours writing down the answer to this question. He advocates getting into the boring, mundane details because the boring and mundane things are what life is made of. Make this a day that you could live over and over again for the rest of your life and be completely content with it.
Frank says that almost as if by magic, he ended up living the exact life he wrote about within the following nine months after doing it.
Pretty cool.
I actually did this exercise, oh, maybe two years ago. I don’t remember where I heard about from back then, I didn’t take it into as insane detail as Frank did. Personally, everything I wrote didn’t come true, but my current reality bears an odd resemblance to what I wrote about.
At the time, I was single, living in some sprawled out suburban desert wasteland in Tempe, Arizona. The heat was oppressive and made me feel miserable most of the time. I was in grad school taking lots of classes that didn’t particularly interest me that much.
I wrote about living in an exciting dense neighborhood where I could walk anywhere. I had an awesome girlfriend and we lived together in a historic apartment building. I spent my days hanging out in coffee shops and creating artwork. My evenings were spent with close friends sharing good times.
Today, I now living in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle, which is pretty cool place. Lots of activity and essentially the complete antithesis of anything you could find in Arizona. I have a girlfriend that fits the description of the girl that I wrote about very closely. I spend my time working on building websites in coffee shops.
Pretty cool! I may not be all the way there, but I think I’m on track to getting what I wrote about two years ago.
I’m going to take some time today to answer the question again. This time in more detail and with more description. I’d recommend that you do this too. When you finish doing this you should be totally jazzed and excited about what you wrote about. You should be chomping at the bit to get out there and make it yours. If you’re not, then you need to go back and do it again, focusing on what you really want for yourself.
It’ll be interesting to see how this goes…
Posted in Goals, Inspiration, Life | Comments (0)
Website Building Update – Week 18
January 2nd, 2010 by Clayton
Alright, a new year! I had some friends over for a few days, so I’m a day late update this week.
I wanted to take a moment to log my monthly income from my first four months of this stuff:
- First Month (September) – $184.50 (I was using PPC)
- Second Month (October) – $38.74 (Quit using PPC — too expensive)
- Third Month (November) – $134.43
- Fourth Month (December) – $317.27
With the holidays and everything, I haven’t been able to focus too much on these websites. The sales from last week have died down a bit, but I’ve had a few more roll in none the less.
Hope you all had a good new year!
Posted in Online Income Experiment | Comments (8)
New Year’s Resolutions
December 29th, 2009 by Clayton
Although I don’t believe that there is anything magical about New Year’s resolutions and that people should constantly strive to improve their lives without limiting it to a once-a-year thing that falls on December 31st, I find great joy in making New Year’s resolutions. It’s a good idea to stop and take stock of things and adjust our trajectories now and again, and New Year’s is just as good as any other arbitrary date.
Plus it seems to be trendy this year not to make New Year’s resolutions. Being the stubborn contrarilian that I am, I’m going to do it anyway.
What has 2009 brought for me?
- I finished grad school.
- I left Arizona and moved to a city that I enjoy much more than Phoenix.
- I heard someone say “I love you” to me for the first time in almost three years (not counting my mom or best friend).
- I decided to go out on a limb and use the rest of my savings to try and start a business that may just end up financing the rest of my life (!).
- I became poor.
- I left the country (even if it was just Canada, and even if it was only for four days).
- I decided to follow my dreams.
Overall, pretty good. I must say, this isn’t the way I planned on everything playing out. I wish I made more money, and I wish my girlfriend and I could travel more, and I wish she didn’t have to go to work at a job she doesn’t like. But I suspect that will be a story for 2010.
For 2010, I’m making a few resolutions:
- I want to get up to making about $40-50k per year online.
- I want to begin outsourcing and removing myself from the equation so I can have free time.
- I want to be able to pay for my girlfriend to go to school full-time for Spring Quarter (around March).
- I want the two of us to go on a one-month mini-retirement to Thailand.
- I want to study Japanese.
- I want to take some art classes.
- I want to participate in NaNoWriMo in November.
- I want to develop this blog into something more.
- I want to laugh in the face of everyone who told me to get a job and that I was wasting my time (this is my petty goal for the sake of revenge and my ego).
- I want us to move to San Francisco.
- I want to buy new clothes (haven’t in two years).
Well, I guess that’s pretty much it. When you’re setting goals, it’s important to go into insane detail about them. I’ll spare you all my rambling daydreams and write them down privately. But, well, I’d like to come back to this post next year and see how I did.
So hold my feet to the fire, and make sure I make an effort to make these goals a reality.
I hope you all have a great New Year’s. And I hope we all have a great 2010!
Posted in Goals | Comments (2)
Website Building Update – Week 17
December 25th, 2009 by Clayton
So tomorrow is the official 4-month anniversary for me working on these websites.
After a little thinking, I’ve decided to shelf the JFK “high tide raising all ships” approach and focus solely on doing a full SEO job on Website #4. Website #4 is probably the most efficient website I’ve made yet at pulling in money. This is due partly to the fact that it is targeting a very hungry niche (with a high conversion rate) and partly due to the fact that I’ve gotten better at building these things over time. My girlfriend is even helping me spin a few articles after she gets home from work, which is much appreciated.
Once this is done, Website #4 should be a lean, money-making machine that will keep the cash rolling in while I bring the other sites up to speed.
So, I’m also putting off finishing Website #5 for now. I guess I won’t finish it by the end of 2009. That’s fine with me.
Since last week, my fortune has improved again. Once I finished my pity party last week, I went and did some last minute Christmas shopping and came home to see that I picked up a sale. Follow that up with additional sales on nearly every day this week and suddenly I’m left with my jaw hanging open.
I’m not really sure where all this is coming from. None of the stats on my sites have really improved that much, but I’m very grateful and I hope this keeps up.
I hope everyone has a great holiday season. More updates to come in 2010!
Posted in Online Income Experiment | Comments (8)
Website Building Update – Week 16
December 18th, 2009 by Clayton
I came to a sad realization this week that I really need to spin every single article on my websites. Suddenly, I have about 60 articles to spin. I find this depressing because I really hate spinning articles. But I can get so much out of a spun article. I can submit these articles to a butt load of directories and put them up on web 2.0 sites. Plus I can feed them into blog networks and get backlinks.
I considered outsourcing it, but it seems that that would cost me somewhere near $1500 US, which I don’t really want to part with right now. (Did I mention I’m broke?)
So, now it’s time to just man up and do it. I figure I can force myself to do one every day. That should get things started.
Plus, when I’m done, I’ll have three times as many backlinks, which should be just what I need to start pushing a few more pages onto the front page of Google.
Also, I’m still cranking out content for website #5, which I still want to get finished by the end of the year. I can do it, but all this spinning will slow me down a bit.
Once I’m done, I’ll have 5 websites up. I understand that I should expect to make about $50-$200/week from each site. Once all five get up to full speed, that should mean $13,000 – $52,000 US per year.
Okay, so I wouldn’t be rich, but if I can get near the upper end of that, then that’s a full-time income which could afford a comfortable life and even a little outsourcing. Plus I really want to pull in enough money so my girlfriend can quit her job. She really doesn’t like it and she wants to help me with these websites.
If both of us could work on these sites, then we could trade tasks back and forth. When I’m ready to blow my brains out from spinning articles, she could take over and I could start doing something that requires no thought like directory submissions. We could peel these sites out twice as fast!
Here’s my weekly sales snapshot. It’s pretty lame. No sales this week. There’s a spike today, but that’s just a rebill from months ago. I’ll be honest, I’m feeling pretty low right now. I figured by now I’d have at least one site up to full speed cranking out at least $50/week. I’m finding that I’m riddled with doubt and I’m honestly not sure what else I can do except to keep plugging away at this.
Fuck...
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Website Building Update – Week 15
December 11th, 2009 by Clayton
This week my girlfriend went back to Arizona to visit her family for a few days. I spent the time aggressively building links to the first four websites. I pulled out all the stops and I started implementing some web 2.0 sites like Squidoo and Hubpages in addition to hunting down a small handful of .edu and .gov backlinks.
I had been holding off on this stuff because part of me thought it would be spamming to do all this just for the backlinks. At least with the article directories there’s a symbiotic relationship. They get content, I get backlinks. Plus a guy that goes by “jem008″ posted his clickbank screen shots over at Affilorama and he’s making about $200-$300 per day from only article marketing.
I’ll admit I’m a little desperate for some real results with all this affiliate marketing stuff. It seems like it’s taking longer than it should. So I decided to go ahead with the web 2.0 and .edu/.gov backlinks. I figure it’s not spam if I offer real value and put time into crafting high quality content. So I found about 8 web 2.0 sites and a few .edu/.gov blogs and started slugging away.
I’m also very cautiously starting a very conservative PPC campaign. My limit is only $10/day. I got burned when I tried it out over the summer, but I figure I’m probably going to have to do it sooner or later, so I should just start. I’m using Website #4 this time though, which seems to convert better, so let’s hope things workout. I’m not sure why, but I’m more nervous about doing AdWords this time around even though I have an extremely conservative budget.
I tend to keep doubting myself. I somehow find ways of convincing myself that the past few sales were just a coincidence or something. Regardless, I made one sale this week to someone in Norway.
Still not raking in the cash just yet, but I’d like to think I’m on my way…
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