The Niche Think Tank » attitude of gratitude

The Real Life Struggles Of An Online Entrepreneur

Larry C. — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 18:35:36 +0000

It’s been a while since I’ve posted here, and there are several reasons why, which I will go into. Let me first explain a little about this post and the reason for posting it.

I’ve been blogging on here for a while now relating my successes and struggles. I also read many other blogs on success, making money online, personal improvement and the location independent lifestyle. One thing I have noticed about most, if not all, is the lack of struggles that happen. I don’t read much about the struggles and hardships they go through and many write about how everything seems peachy and rosy.

I’m not here to bitch and complain, but I think people should see or hear what some of us go through, because it isn’t all peaches and cream in the life of a successful blogger/online entrepreneur. There have been things that have happened that make me question why I am doing this, why I continue to try to make it big like others, and do I want to press the Publish button when I am done writing this post.

Everyone talks about being authentic or being transparent but I never hear about the bad shit. Show me you’re a real person and tell me what’s really going on in your life once in a while. I want to know you are for real.

I have this blog and things have been a little rough the past few months, and I need to write about it.

Business Stuff

Back in December things were really looking good, I mean really good! Income was going through the roof thanks to Christmas, the niche sites were really working well and I felt like I had finally made it to the big time.

Then Google hit with the Panda Update.

Some of my main money makers took a hit, a huge hit. My Adsense income went from $20-$30 a day to $2-$8 a day and my Amazon Associate sales feel quite a bit too because of the lowered traffic my sites had. You can read This Thread at the Google Webmasters Forum and see all the others who have been hit. People who have good sites with original content, yet are losing traffic and income because of the Panda Update, all in one fell swoop.

On June 16th Google pushed out Panda 2.2 and many people, including myself, have seen some recovery from the initial Panda update. This is the latest and just one of several updates done to Panda since it’s release back on February 24th.

My Adsense income has gone back up to $20-$30+ a day again and it’s been a much needed change and recovery. But it’s guarded. What I mean is that I can’t and won’t put much trust in Google again. Well let me say this that I never really trusted Google to begin with anyway. Having a monopoly on search engine traffic and customizing peoples search results isn’t being quite honest in my opinion. This is why I diversified my online income, so my eggs weren’t all in one basket, but it was a good part of my arsenal. I am further diversifying my arsenal for the next time something like this happens. And it will happen, trust me.

Family Stuff

One thing that has had me way distracted and very angry was the lead test that came back positive for my daughter Sarah. The landlord had done some renovations which weren’t conducted properly, nor was the clean up done properly, and my daughter was exposed to lead dust.

This house was built in 1927 and it is covered in lead paint. Most of the time, if the paint isn’t disturbed things are ok, but the lead laws in San Diego make it mandatory that a lead certified construction company do the lead abatement whenever there are renovations going on. This was not done.

Consequently my daughter tested positive for lead and when I asked the landlord to pay for testing to find the source, he refused. Further investigation lead me to the Lead Safe Neighborhood Program of San Diego. After telling them my story they opened a case on this house, came and tested the painted surfaces, took dust samples and cited the owner. The owner had 45 days to comply or be hit with heavy fines for violating health and safety codes.

New renovations have been done by a Lead Certified company and removed even more lead paint from this house in the safety of containment containers. However the owner and the rental agency have made us feel as if we were the bad guys for calling the city on them. It still really bothers me they did this, actually it makes me so damn angry, it’s not even funny. We still have yet to get an apology from the owner.

We’ve been looking for a new place to live and we don’t need their attitude. I am also sure after the “No Retaliation” period of 6 months is over, they will give us the boot. Either way, moving sucks but we need a place to live that is attitude and lead paint free.

In doing my homework I found what removes lead from the body: vegetables high in Iron like greens and Apple juice to name a few. Three months after the initial lead test we had her tested again and the lead has been eradicated from her body. Thankfully she didn’t have to go through chelation therapy. We are relieved and happy to have this lead removed from her tiny body, yet we still have to take her to get evaluations for her growth and learning progress to see if there are any long lasting effects from the lead poisoning.

It’s been almost 6 months since her initial lead test came back positive, the lead is gone but we are still dealing with the after effects of this situation. Doctor and therapist appointments, feelings of anger and helplessness, and wondering if her IQ has been affected or not. It’s not something a parent wants to hear has happened to their child knowing it could have been prevented.

Amazon Associates Program Gets the Ax in California

Here’s a screen shot of the letter I received from Amazon:

Amazon Associates Cancellation Letter

I had waited a week before hitting the publish button just to make sure I really wanted to publish this post. I guess there was another reason I waited and now I know why. Another blow has hit online entrepreneurs who reside in California. This blow comes in the form of the cancellation of the Amazon Associates program in California. This is because Amazon and other companies like OverStock.com are taking a stand on what they feel is unconstitutional and counter-productive.

Many, many people in California, and other states(California isn’t the only state who did this) who’ve been axed, depended on the income that Amazon Associated Program gave them. Many people have been ruined and some have probably lost their homes and livelihoods or worse. I counted on the income from Amazon too, but it wasn’t my sole source of income, as I said previously I diversified my income and it was only a part of my income. While it is making things interesting, it is not the devastating blow many people have felt.

Amazon isn’t the only affiliate program that has given Californians the boot. I’ve been kicked out of no less than 5 other affiliate programs due to the new law. Mainly companies who have no physical presence in California. I’ve had to search for comparable affiliate programs, but the biggest blow for me, is that many of my niche sites are dependent on Amazon for the products in the niche. Amazon has a HUGE, no, THE HUGEST inventory of just about anything you can think of. I looked at Barnes & Noble and Borders, and neither of those giants have the selection of the books or products I need to make money with my niche sites.

So what am I doing?

Some of my sites are being sold on Flippa, such as this site: Kindle Covers and Cases which brought in $1,649.10 in December of 2010 and it continues to bring in sales each month. I could get an LLC in another state to continue to work with Amazon, but I don’t really want to go through the hassle of getting an LLC in another state to continue to operate with Amazon Associates. At least not yet. I am hoping the tax law will be over turned and we will get our associates program back. For now I am selling it on Flippa, as well as some of my other sites.

Another thing I am doing…

Another thing I have been doing is focusing on niche sites that I have an active interest in and selling eBooks, such as my Boudoir Photography Poses website. This site, on average right now, has an average of 46 daily visitors, and it sells between $25-$50 worth affiliate sales in eBooks each day on the subject of Boudoir photography Tips.I started this site after the Google panda update hit the first time, in an effort to supplement the lose of the Adsense income I had. This along with the recovery of my Adsense income has helped to offset the lose of the Amazon Affiliates Program.

Dealing with stress and remembering what’s important…

In May of this year we had a family wedding to attend in Ohio. We stayed at my sister-in-laws in Kentucky which is right across the Ohio River from Cincinnati, Ohio. I decided that I wasn’t going to do ANY work at all. I had at first thought I would do some posts and get caught up on this blog, but decided not to. I did however have to review and approve personal profiles for the dating sites I run. This is about 10 minutes per day just before bed and that was all I did.

Taking time for the family…The Attitude of Gratitude

First, I spent lot’s of time with my girls: my wife and my two daughters.

My daughter and I on a quiet Kentucky dirt road

The next thing I did was not worry about business, knowing that whatever is supposed to happen, is going to happen no matter what I do. I just tried to do the next indicated step. Knowing that no matter what happens, everything will be OK. I’m an entrepreneur and entrepreneurs are survivors. I’m a survivor. If one thing fails I go to another thing or way of making money.

The next thing I did was spend some time with my parents who came down just to baby site and see the girls. That was nice. My dad hadn’t met the younger one, Hannah, and my mom hadn’t seen her since she was born. We went to the zoo with my parents and the kids and spent the day feeding the goats in the childrens zoo, riding the miniature train(Sarah loves trains) and just enjoying the free time of not having to work.

Worrying about what’s going to happen, does nothing but make you sick and paralyzed. There’s nothing that worrying has ever solved for me, so I just went with the flow. I just turned 47 last month and I’m not getting any younger so spending time with my daughters is paramount in my daily life. Who knows what the future holds for us, but I remember an old saying, ” Yesterday is gone, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift.”

Another saying is “If you have one foot in the past, and one foot in the future, you’re pissing on the present”.

Things do happen in the lives of successful people and their not always pleasant. Staying grounded and keeping what’s really important close to your heart, will help you get through anything. My grandfather used to say ” If you have a shovel you can always dig ditches”. My head is the shovel, life is the ditch. I dig life, it’s an adventure worth living.

So what Amazon is gone for me now, maybe it will come back, maybe it won’t. I’ll do other things that help to support the family and my lifestyle of working at home, close to the family. So what Google made my traffic almost nil for some sites and my income go down a bit, I’ll just do something else like sell eBooks and do photography. So what all this is happening around me, what really matters is what’s important and close to my heart, my family. That is what’s truly important.

Without the bad we wouldn’t be able to gauge the good or know true happiness.

This post goes out to my mentor and teacher Yaro Starak. My thoughts are with you and your Mum.

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Amazon Trademark Infringement, Ooopsss…

Larry C. — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 04:24:25 +0000

It’s been a little over 2 months since I posted last, in fact December 6th was the last post. I had been busy making sites and getting them indexed for the rush of Christmas traffic, and just got caught up in the whirl wind of excitement. LOTS of things happenin’g and happened since then, one of which I am not too happy about, Trademark Infringement.

Yep, that’s right, I infringed on someone’s trademark, Amazon.Com. Ooopsss…

Basically it’s been a while since I had read the Amazon OA(Operating Agreement), and didn’t realize that I built a website that would eventually have them contacting me about. Thou Shalt Not use any of Amazon’s trademarked names(Amazon, Kindle,Etc.) in a domain name/URL. Two that I had and were running were www.kindlecoversandcases.com and www.thekindleboard.com.

Kindle covers and cases was a niche site that made a good deal of money over the course of the past year with December being a really great month. Then I sorta sandboxed myself a little with over zealous back linking. But that’s for another post, which I will tell the whole story and how I got out of the Google sandbox. The other site, thekindleboard.com was a forum for discussion of Kindles, eBooks and eBook authors, as well as other eBook readers.

I received an email, founding it in my spam folder, and read it:

We recently contacted you about our concerns with your domain names, and we have not received a response. Please know that we value your participation in Amazon’s Associates program. By requesting that you use alternate domain names, we are attempting to make sure that there is always a clear distinction between the official “Amazon” site and other third party sites. Your current use of the (insert domain name), (insert domain name) and (insert domain name) domains is a violation of the Associates Program Operating Agreement. The registration of these domain names also violates Amazon.com’s trademark, proprietary and other rights. Please review the Associates Program Operating Agreement for more details.

Please choose new domain names and transfer your content to those names. Amazon will purchase your domains (insert domain name), (insert domain name) and (insert domain name) for the initial registration prices, provided that you agree to not register any domains containing Amazon brands, or a misspelling of those brands, in the future.

If we do not hear from you regarding the above within two weeks from the date of this email, we will have no alternative but to close your Associates account and withhold payment of all advertising fees in accordance with the Agreement.

So does this David fight the Goliath Amazon and take a chance on losing all my earnings for the past 3 months? Hell no! Are you kidding? Would you throw away $4000 in affiliate sales? Yeah, I didn’t think so. I actually had 9 domain names in total with the word “Kindle” in it, but only using 4 of them. Rather than give Amazon only the 3 they listed, and still use the other 6 domain names and take a chance on losing my Associate income and my Associate account, I decided to hand over all 9 domains. They promptly paid me $10 each for a total of $90.

Another interesting thing with Amazon is they don’t want you using other peoples trademarked names either. So names like Revlon, such as in a domain name RevlonMascaraReviews.com would be a no-no. I know many people who DO use trademarked names in their URLs, and don’t get caught, but is it really worth losing your income, house or other because of it? Not in my book.

So what am I going to do with the traffic from those sites? or what am I going to do with the brand I had built up? I could just let it go or I could get another domain name and do a permanent redirect to the new site. So what did I do with those sites I built up? I moved them each to a new domain: eBook Covers and Cases and eReader Forum.

I’m happy that Amazon.com was cordial enough to work with me and just take the domains off my hands and not my income I had acquired. Lesson learned.

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Blogging, One Year Later, Where I’ve Been, Where I’m Going…

Larry C. — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 10:07:53 +0000

Technically it’s been a little over a year, but who’s counting, maybe 13-14 months, but it’s been a year. I’ve come a long way since I started reading Yaro Staraks Blog, one of the biggest reasons I am still doing this. I was in his Blog Mastermind program after reading so much good content on his blog, and reading his reviews of products. I am finally starting to make a living from doing this blog business that I have built. The money from my efforts didn’t come right away, it took a while, it actually started coming in more recently, starting at about 6-9 months into it. It’s continued to grow monthly since. It’s taken basically about a year for me to realize that I can make a living from blogging. If you blog for less than a year and give up, you’re wasting your time.

It’s given me personal freedoms I have wanted for so long, such as being here everyday with my family as my two young daughters grow up. I no longer live the 9to5 life, I don’t drive in crappy morning traffic anymore, and I get to go push my daughter in a swing at the park, anytime I want to. Which, for most days, is everyday. Why? Because I can, and I really enjoy it.

We just had daughter number two, so we are settled down for a little bit to rest, and raise her(Hannah). After about 6 months to a year we hope to start hitting the road. Soon we will be traveling here in the US, while I prep my family for extended travel abroad. I personally have a health issue that I need medication for everyday, and I am working on how to get it over seas, with my insurance to still pay for it. Maybe I can have someone pick it up for me and ship it to me? or maybe I can get a couple months advance and take it with me? or maybe my insurance has a plan for overseas delivery. Who knows, I’ll make it work somehow. I always do.

I haven’t always blogged here at The Niche Think Tank, as I wasn’t really sure about what I should be blogging about(I have other projects too). I was thinking it would be the “Make Money Online” type blog, but there are so many of those, so I kept thinking. Then I became aware of a guy by the name of David Crandall, thanks to Srini over at BlogcastFM and The Skool of Life.

Srini and David made an audio Teleclass one day, I bought it and it moved me so much, that I decided to contact David Crandall and talk to him about Fear. Fear of Podcasting, Fear of Blogging, Getting over my Fear, and a few other little topics that culminated in a spiritual awakening. David is a Christian, and while I often refer to myself as a recovering Catholic, I am a deeply spiritual man. I get my connection with my higher power when I am either surfing, hiking in the desert or in an empty church, with just me and him. Anyway, I digress.

I believe that birds of a feather flock together. If you surround yourself with like minded or positive people, they tend to rub off and have an influence on you. That Skype conversation I had with David Crandall had a very positive influence on me. He helped to open my eyes to something I have. My Story.

David showed to me, myself, in such a way it gave me the courage, strength and drive to take this to the next level. At least that’s what I am working towards. While I have two other blogs that I work on, www.rockabillylifestyle.com and my photography site, www.darkmansdarkroom.com, I am going to be starting at least one other blog, maybe two. These two other blogs will be where I open up and talk about how I’m doing life, on one hell of a roller coaster and how I was able to make it through the ride, to where I am today.

You see, I’m a recovering Addict, and on my travels through life, I’ve learned a lot about myself, about love, about life and other people. I’ve also had the (un?)fortunate experience of picking up a couple life threatening illness, which have helped to shape me into what I am today, the man I want to be and am becoming. It was through realizing my own mortality, and being given a death sentence in 1987, that I realized there is more to life than doing drugs and drinking. It was time to make a life change.

This isn’t just about making money, it’s about living life to the fullest, being present not only for my life, but for the lives of my wife, and my daughters. It’s about suiting up and showing up. Participating in life everyday, as if there’s no tomorrow. Because someday, there will be no tomorrow.

I got a second chance, I better not fuck Mess it up. I need to make it count.

So, to Yaro, Srini & Sid, David, Cody, Dan & Ian, Pat and a host of others which I have mentioned in the past, thank you. Thank You for the help, guidance and insight into myself and where I am going and possibly what I should be doing with my life.

Death Valley Dunes

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Speech Recognition for Bloggers – The Ultimate Guide

Larry C. — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 07:26:53 +0000

I’m subscribed to Copyblogger as should all of you be, and I got the post for the day and it talks about speech recognition software. I’ve been “playing” around with speech recognition for a little while, but only getting frustrated with it as it works half the time if that. I watched the video at the second link that Copyblogger listed which is at Problogger. Leave it to a guy in a wheelchair to come up with the Ultimate Guide to Speech Recognition. Certainly he needed it, but he took his disability and used it to his advantage and came up with Speech Recognition for Bloggers: The Ultimate Guide

I give major kudos to Jon Morrow for not only overcoming what most people who just succumb too, but to overcome and move past his disability and become an integral and hard to replace member of one of the best blog teams on the net. I myself am glad to have watched this video because I was getting ready to trash the software and mic, but now I think I can make this work for me.

Check out the video and come back and give me a comment or two. See what you think from this guy in a wheelchair…

Enjoy…

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What I have learned from blogging

Larry C. — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 19:29:51 +0000

Today is my daughters 1st birthday. I am taking her to the San Diego Zoo and taking her directly to the petting zoo. I want her to get a feel, literally, for the animals. It’s her day today and I want to make it special. Although she may never remember this day, she can still have a really good day. She is/was the best thing that happened to me, aside from my wife.

In trying to make ends meet in this crappy economy, I have started to really pursue blogging in an effort to increase my income, as well as do more niche marketing. I already do niche marketing in several hot niche markets, but I also run several dating sites that do rather well for me.

The thing that Blogging had taught me about running these other sites is word choice, phrasing and meaning of what I am writing. I am still working on sentence structure and punctuation. It’s been a long time since I was in English class. I have been studying things like copy writing, sales techniques and formulating a phrase that will emotionally grab someone and hopefully get them to purchase a product.

I have sat here in reflection of what I am writing, where I have been, where I am going and how far I have come in my life. I’ve come a very long way, done many incredible things and am surviving and living with a life threatening illness. I am a miracle in some peoples eyes, but sometimes a loser in my own. I have learned to focus, to have follow through and complete the task at hand. I have also learned patience, but still need to work on that.

The one thing I have learned, through blogging, is there are no get rich quick schemes, it takes time, effort and hard work. I have learned to stop and smell the roses. I think the most important thing I have learned through blogging is to appreciate what I already have, and not focus on what I don’t have. Life is good, and it is getting better. I can’t say enough about how having an attitude of gratitude has helped me to really get the most out of life.

That’s it kids, have an attitude of gratitude and the universe will be yours and it will give.

Have a great day,

Larry C.

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The Niche Think Tank » attitude of gratitude

The Real Life Struggles Of An Online Entrepreneur

Business Stuff

Family Stuff

Amazon Associates Program Gets the Ax in California

So what am I doing?

Another thing I am doing…

Dealing with stress and remembering what’s important…

Taking time for the family…The Attitude of Gratitude

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Amazon Trademark Infringement, Ooopsss…

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Blogging, One Year Later, Where I’ve Been, Where I’m Going…

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Speech Recognition for Bloggers – The Ultimate Guide

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