The Niche Think Tank » Niche Marketing

Income Report for October 2010

Larry C. — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 19:53:32 +0000

Hey Folks, I know it’s been way to long since I posted here and I still need to catch up on my income reports for the past year+ up to the present (1/2012). I’ve had many changes happening in my life recently and it’s complicated matters in the way of niche marketing and making my niche sites as well. Complications that have caused me to not be able to make any new niche sites in the last 3 months of 2011 and the only work being done on the sites I did have were back links by my VA. Yes I have a VA now and that’s for another post.

As some of you know my daughter was exposed to lead due to some shoddy renovations done by the landlord of the place we lived. Because of legal issues with that and bad feelings between he and my family we decided to look for a new place to live and move out. In our process of looking we thought we had found a place and gave a deposit to the people of the new place while we haggled over the lease terms. After not being able to get things in writing, or being told one thing one day, and having it change the following day I decided not to rent from the new landlord and ask for our deposit back. They said we did not fulfill the terms of the rental application and therefore they were going to keep our deposit and deduct a days rent for everyday it did not rent that month, until it gets rented. They eventually sent us a check for about $600 stating they finally got the place rented. Needless to say I was pissed.

I filed against them in small claims court and went back to our current landlord and ask to retract the 30 day notice we had given till be could find a place to live. He said no, he wanted us out and so we had to leave. We couldn’t find a place to live in the 2 weeks left of our lease there so we moved into an extended stay hotel with a kitchenette. And that’s where my experience with location independence started.

We spent two months in that hotel while we looked for a decent place to live and eventually found one that suited our needs as a family. We were able to move in, in the middle of December, just before Christmas, get a Christmas tree and do all of our shopping by Christmas eve. The kids had a great Christmas and so did we. We’re still unpacking and it’s a bit slow as the house we are now in is about 300 sq. ft. smaller than what we were in previously but the yard is big and we now have a pool. We are also paying the same amount of rent we were in the other place and we have a gardener.

We had our day in court with the landlords that kept our deposit and we were able to get back $1500 of the $1850 that we gave them. While I feel we should have gotten it all back, I understand the judge was trying to be fair to all parties and said we did verbally promise to move in. I’m just glad we could get most of our money back. That’s a lot of money in the present times of our economy.

Ok so here’s the income report for October 2010, over a year ago. I’m going to be getting the rest of these income reports done now that I have an office that I can close the door and get down to some serious writing. In the old house my office didn’t have a door and it was also the kids play room. It made it much harder to be able to sit and get some work done as the kids would always interrupt me. Not that I minded it just isn’t conducive to a work environment.

I’d like to thank all of you who purchase products talked about here on this site as I get an affiliate commission from those purchases. It does go directly to helping support my family, my endeavors as a niche marketer and niche site builder. Here’s to your success!

BTW, you’ll notice a slight decrease in this months income, which I’m not going to go into the analysis of as I just want to get the income reports up and going. People want to see the reports and I’ve been lagging. You can compare this months with last months report by looking at Septembers Income Report HERE.

Income Report for October 2010

Amazon – 120.43

Dating Sites – 987.25

eBook Sales(Mine) – 32.91

Affiliate Sales – 129.41

Clickbank Sales – 0

Text Link Ads – 40.06

Google – 449.40

Side Jobs (Hosting, WordPress Installs) – 630.00

Total October $2389.03

Last month (September) $2580.80

Decrease of $191.77

October 2010 Income Report

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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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10 Ways To Monetize a Forum

Larry C. — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 21:46:39 +0000

I was asked in one of the comments on a post here, about monetizing a forum. Good question. The person who asked the question has a forum and felt like it was easier to monetize a blog than a forum and was curious what the experts said.

Since I run several forums as well and need to monetize them too, I thought I’d research the topic and document my finding for everyone else to benefit from.

Since forums are sometimes the place I find answers to questions I have I thought that they would be a great place start. Then read some specific posts about monetizing a forum, and then try a few of the ways myself.

Forums are great for generating content and traffic as people contribute answers to problems, ask questions about problems and discuss findings too. As you know The Big G(Google) likes fresh content all the time. A ravenous appetite for content Google will find forums a feast of plenty, IF you have a good topic for your forum and lot’s of traffic. Even mediocre traffic can generate good content and give Google something to chew on.

So let’s dive into my findings…

1) Adsense – Adding Adsense to your forum is pretty simple given the add-ons you can get for the forum software you use, or it may even be built in, therefore making it that much more simple. You can place Adsense just about anywhere on a forum but just remember the Google Adsense rules for the number of placements per page.

I’ve read arguments for both sides of this. Some people say this is a great way to monetize a forum and others say forums with Adsense have a low CTR(click through rate). Some say “Ad Blindness” meaning we see so many ads from Google all day long we stop seeing them eventually. Depending on what you decide, Adsense will serve up ads for the topic of that post or the forum itself.

2) CPA and CPM Networks - Often times called Publisher Networks, CPA is “cost per action”, usually a sign up of some sort or a completed survey or some sort of “Action”. This might be like those ads you see where you get something for doing something. These are typically lead generating actions, which can pay anywhere from $.50 on up to several dollars or more. I use this type of thing on several of my niche sites and have done very well with them.

CPM is “cost per mille”, Mille being a Latin word meaning thousand, so cost per thousand clicks usually. This is ok if you have a lot of traffic and they like clicking on things, especially if it’s free or they get something really cool. It might do well for some people but not others.

3) Affiliate Networks – Similar to CPA and CPM, Affiliate networks generate Sales as opposed to Leads. The main sales force behind these products are called affiliates. You put an Ad on your site to sell something and get paid a commission for the sale of the product. Some affiliate networks are Commission Junction, Share A Sale, LinkShare, and more.

4) Selling Text Links – Text-Link-Ads.Com is where I go to sell my space for text links. If you’ve got a PR3 or above site and want to earn money effortlessly, go to TLA. Basically all there is are Text Links, that’s it. Either you add them by hand manually, or you put some code on your site that automatically adds them to your page as they advertisers add you to the list of sites to run ads on. Fairly simple and easy, and as one of their ads says, “Earn Money while you Sleep”.

5) Selling Banner Advertisements or Ad Spots – If you have a niche forum and Google just isn’t doing a good job of putting the right kind of ads in their ads for your site, then sell ad spots yourself. One way people do this is to directly contact the prospective advertiser and offer them some space on your forum. So let’s say you have a forum on Salt Water Aquariums, you could sell ad space to an online (or offline) aquarium dealer. Or maybe ad space for a complete pet supply shop or a specialty fish shop. The possibilities are endless.

6) Selling “sticky” threads – Selling sticky threads is like selling ad space. If you’re running a forum you should know what a sticky thread is. A sticky thread is one that sticks at the top of each forum board and stays there all the time, never moving with time or threads so it is always at the top, where it can grab peoples attention.

7) Sponsorship – If you have a really niche market and have a lot of good traffic, you could get sponsorship. There’s a story about Tivo, the Television Recording service that people fell in love with. When Tivo first came out someone started a Tivo Forum for hacks and tips and fixes. Tivo, rather than claiming trademark infringement, rather sponsored the forum by giving them money and had some Tivo Technicians talk in the forums as well. The only catch was that the people in the forum couldn’t talk about how to hack and bypass the payment system. The owners and moderators agreed and police the forum for such topics and therefore Tivo is happy and so is the forum owner who get’s paid by Tivo for that community.

Private Members Area – Just as it says “Members Only”. Charge for a premium membership to exclusive board on the forum. Warrior Forum does this and so does many other forums in a niche culture. I belong to a private forum for Yaro Staraks Blog Mastermind program. This is a blogging program for people to learn to become successful bloggers and earn a living from blogging by producing good content. While the members only forum comes with the program, I paid for the blogging course and have lifetime membership to the forum.

9) Donations – Yeah really! Donations. Put a donation cup on the forum sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. If people find good content or fixes for what troubles them, people are likely to give a donation.

10) Sell Something – Sitepoint forums, a place where you can learn a lot about building sites with PHP and many other web related things, including internet marketing. Sitepoint was once just a place to learn and talk but the owner needed to monetize the site otherwise it was going down. He tracked where the users were most going and found the areas of what they were looking for and made a few print on demand books in the areas of PHP/MySQL/ CSS. Now the site makes tons of money from these publications with their second book generating over $1 million in the first 12 months of it’s release.

So you’ve got a forum on Black Banded African Gerbils? Sell either an eBook or Print on Demand book on The Complete Care and Feeding Guide for Black Banded African Gerbils.

10 ways to monetize your forum, hopefully will bring you 10 ideas per point, to give you at least 100 different ways to monetize your forum.

I really appreciate your support of this blog and the use of my affiliate links. It’s because of you that this blog is alive, growing and informing.

I’d love to hear your comments, suggestions or success stories.

Thanks for all your comments in previous posts, and please keep your questions coming.

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Dan Andrews @ Lifestyle Business Podcast – Podcast Interview #4

Larry C. — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 19:52:44 +0000

Hey folks, I had the awesome opportunity to meet up with Dan Andrews from The Lifestyle Business Podcast, The Tropical MBA and Outsource to the Philippines at a local coffee shop here in San Diego and get to know the man behind these three sites. For me Dan Andrews and his partner Ian were somewhat of a mystery. They talked about business pursuits and strategies, have good content, are entertaining, but never said what exactly they make or do. I finally got to find out at the coffee shop and demystify the mystery.

Not only did Dan tell me some of the industries they have their hands in, but the exact products they manufacture and sell. Dan and his partner Ian are no longer the mystery they used to be, they are THE REAL DEAL. They don’t talk lifestyle theory and try to sell you some product, they live the life, and use the techniques and strategies they talk about. They walk their talk. In fact they JUST recently put up a product for the first time for sale on The Lifestyle Business Podcast, the first 3 seasons of the podcast(AL)!

I’ve listened to podcasts where there’s 30-45 minutes of fluff, and maybe 10 minutes of an actually real tip, but not with these guys, these guys aren’t trying to shove product down your throats, they are all content and loads of fun. If you haven’t listened to their podcast yet you’re leaving money on the table. Go there now, listen to their podcast and leave a comment and tell them Larry @ The Niche Think Tank sent you, you’ll be glad you did.

Here’s some show notes:

Outsource to the Philippines

The Tropical MBA

The Lifestyle Business Podcast

Dan’s Beginning (@TropicalMBA)

Courier Flights for Cheap Travel

Interrogated in Vietnam

Prototypical Tim Ferris Realization

Ian is The Niche Machine (@AnythingIan)

Relationships are Key

Relationships with people doing what you want to do, will give you opportunities.

Srini @BlogCastFM

To Twitter or Not to Twitter

BLEEP, BLEEP, BLEEP

Zero-Sum Market

The Origin of Balla!

Hey Support the Lifestyle Business Podcast and get some great content too, CLICK HERE(affiliate Link).

BTW, there’s a bit of bleep-bleep in the podcast this time. Forewarned.

Podcast:

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Google Search Results Are Skewed – How To Get Real Search Results

Larry C. — Sat, 26 Feb 2011 21:14:35 +0000

How To Get Rid of Google Personalized Search

Many people may already know that Google personalizes search results based on your search and browse patterns, but I didn’t realize how it affected me and my business until just recently. When I thought my websites were climbing in the ranks to page 1 of Google they really weren’t on page 1, they were more on page 2 or 3.

Google is using what is commonly know as Personalized Search. This changes the search results based on the websites you’ve previously visited. While this might be great in some instances, it’s very misleading in others and can hurt your web based internet business and keep you from really attaining the #1 position in Google if you’re not careful.

Because I visit my websites more than other websites in the search results when I do a search of my keywords, the search rankings and results are skewed and not as accurate as some believe. This gives a false sense of security and reality for those who have no idea Google is customizing the search results based on search history.

So me, being a niche marketer who depends on knowing his ranking in the Search Engine Results Pages, needs to know where I stand with the Google, as most of my traffic will come from Google. I need to know so I can determine what course of action I should take for getting my ranking higher, or if I just need to maintain my current status. I also need to have an accurate result so I can best assess my competition based on their true ranking, and not what Google thinks I want to see. Make sense?

There are several things you can do to get a true search result. One is go to an anonymizer search system such as Scroogle.org and use their un-skewed results and also get no ads. Another thing you can do is turn off Google’s Personalized Search by reading their instructions HERE.

I use both Scroogle and Turned off the Personalized Search and now get the more accurate results when I search my keywords and look at my competition.

Thanks to Pat Flynn at smartpassiveincome.com for the Scroogle Tip, and be sure to read the little fiction story on Scroogle.org Called “Scroogled“, pretty good read.

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Steve Chou’s Wife Quit Her Job – Podcast Interview #3

Larry C. — Tue, 16 Nov 2010 16:16:58 +0000

I came across Steve Chou’s website www.mywifequitherjob.com, which is all about starting and running an eCommerce store on the internet. I was very interested in this site as it went through the steps and ups and downs of running an online store. Having read Timothy Ferris’ 4 Hour Work Week, I have dreams of running an online store which I can outsource all the work.

Steve and his wife make a nice 6 figure income with this store, and they started it so Steve’s wife could stay at home and raise their children. Steve’s wife had said, “When I get pregnant, I’m quitting my job”. With that in mind they had to find a way of replacing her 6 figure income in the Silicon Valley.

They make a nice tidy income from their store www.bumblebeelinens.com, which specializes in Wedding Handkerchiefs and other linens for weddings and special holidays. How does he make a 6 figure income with such a tiny specialized niche? I’ll let him tell you.

Podcast is at the bottom after the show notes.

Show Notes:

4Hour Work Week
bumblebeelinens.com
Stalking Your Customers
John Chow
Over Lapping Vendors
www.worldwidebrands.com
www.globalsources.com
www.cantonfair.org.cn
Audible for audiobooks for your iPod – incase you have ADD/ADHD
www.alibaba.com
Killing Your Hobby
The Google Dance – The Evil Empire
Confusing Google
Snow Blowers in the Summer
Keep It Simple
How problems can sometimes create more business
eCommerce carts, Zen Cart, OSCMax, Magento
Products Steve Loves
Follow Steve at Twitter @mywifequit

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How Pat Flynn Got Started In His Niche Market – Podcast Interview #1

Larry C. — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 17:37:25 +0000

How Pat Flynn Got Started In His Niche Market – Podcast Interview

(Podcast is at the bottom)

I had the pleasure of interviewing Pat Flynn for my first podcast interview, and get the details of the story of how he got started in Niche Marketing. I because aware of Pat when I stumble onto his blog on August 27th, 2009. It was a post about parents think making money online is ridiculous, and I could totally relate to this as my parents are the same way. Because I could relate, I started following Pat and watched him and his blog grow from there on out.

His story starts out with how his market chose him, instead of him choosing his market. A chance happening with luck and fate and how he now makes $20K a month from his online ventures. This story is a reminder that sometimes we don’t get to choose our niches, they choose us. This is a good thing for some of us that this happens, because if it were left to our own choices, we might not be succeeding in the niche of our choosing.

Today, Pat is involved in several different venture that bring in income. From his eBook about the LEED Exam, to iPhone Apps, to smaller niche sites that are now making a passive income to augment his monthly income stream. You can follow Pat’s progress and watch his monthly income reports at his blog SmartPassiveIncome.Com, for a better idea of how he does this.

Mentions:

Making Money Online is Ridiculous
Having the drive to succeed in online business
Top Secret WordPress Plugin
Being able to be a stay at home parent
Coffee Shop offices and Quality of Problems
The current economy and the Great Depression
iPone apps from www.lolerapps.com
Joel Comm @ Joel Comm(website), Joel on Twitter: @joelcomm
Adam Baker @ ManvsDebt.Com(Website) Adam on Twitter: @manvsdebt
Naomi Dunford @ IttyBiz.Com(website), Naomi on Twitter: @NaomiDunford
Tyrone Shum @ TyroneShum.Com(website), Tyrone on Twitter: @tyroneshum
Niche Duel Hub at SmartPassiveIncome.Com
Flippa for Niche Sites and Keyword Research and targeted Niche Traffic
My Product on Niche Websites and Niche Marketing
Being an A-Lister
David Crandall @ Heroic Destiny(website), David on Twitter @davidcrandall
Darren Rowse
http://www.greenexamacademy.com
Advice to New Bloggers with little to no money, to boost financial worth
e-How, Info Barrel

Podcast:

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What can New Internet Marketers Learn from Michigan J. Frog?

Larry C. — Tue, 19 Oct 2010 06:19:54 +0000

I love Michigan J. Frog. For many of you my age(46) you know exactly who I am talking about, for the younger crowd, you may know him as the WB Frog. However he is not the WB Frog, he is Michigan J.

Michigan J. Frog has a valuable lesson to teach us, in this little cartoon from 1955, and I would like to see if you can guess it before I give away the answer. To help you figure it out, I am including the cartoon here for all of you to watch and see for yourself, all the right things were there for him to become a huge hit.

All the right marketing and promotions, the word of mouth, the discounts and bonuses(free beer), and a large crowd gathering to see the singing frog. Only one thing was missing, can you guess what it was?

Many times in today’s world of online marketing and lifestyle design, we get everything together and we try to give, sell or release a product to our potential audience. We’ve got a great design for the site or blog, we’ve got all the right marketing colors, the right set price, the promotions are taken care of and everyone is waiting for the launch of our new product.

We launch and everything goes right, and then… everyone wants a refund. Why?

Watch the video, see if you can guess what is missing, and then scroll down to the bottom for the answer. I’d really like to have some interaction, so please, post your reactions, thoughts and guesses to what you thought was “Missing”.

Want the answer?

Scroll Down…

Michigan J. Frog

Keep Going…

The Answer Is…

Make sure your product performs for your audience,
and not just you, before you try to sell it.

Comments please…

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Adversity, The Catalyst for Change and Success

Larry C. — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 19:48:28 +0000

Sometimes, things just gotta change…

Naomi Dunford wrote a nice post for Problogger’s Birthday, and it gave me the inspiration to write about my own adversity in life.

The Adverse Incident

On April 15th, 1987, I was told I had a life threatening illness and was given about 1 year to live. It was mind numbing. As the doctor handed me a packet of information, I got up and walked out of his office, as his voice slipped into that hollow sort of echo-y distance like in the movies. I walked out to the parking lot where I fell to my knees and started to cry. Life as I knew it, was over.

All sorts of things were going through my head – How long do I have? Is there a cure? Would anyone ever love me again? Would anyone want to make love to me anymore? Would they see past the scary, ugly monster and see the real me, a person, a real person, not just this scary dis-ease? Was I damaged goods? Will I be alone for the rest of my life? On and on ad nauseum.

After a year or so of living in worry about how long I had, I realized that things might be ok. I decided I was still alive and I should go on living. I was put on a medication that made things manageable, and told there was no time limit. So on I go, but still the questions persisted: Will anyone ever want to be with me ever again?

The Push

There was a time, after this diagnoses, I was seeing a woman for a short period of time, and I decided it was time to tell her about my illness. We were sitting in her car after having a date night, kissing and laughing and then I decided it was time. I got sort of quiet and then started to tell her, that there was something I felt she should know.

After I told her she sat there quietly thinking. She didn’t know what to say and said she needed to go home. Right then, she leaned over, opened my door and pushed me out! Can your Believe that?!? She pushed me out of her car and I fell on the ground. As she drove away I just sat there for a few minutes, wondering if this is what I could expect for the rest of my life.

The Catalyst for Change

Fast forward nine years, I’m in a relationship with a young lady I had been seeing for almost two years now. Previous to this, I had no real relationships to speak of, things were great, or so I had thought. Soon after the 2 year mark we broke up. I was heart broken to say the least. Was this to be how life was going to end up, alone, no one in my life to speak of?

The Move to Change

That’s when it hit me, a dating service was needed for people like me. What we needed was a place to meet where people were alike, where we wouldn’t be shunned, ridiculed or rejected for the illness we had. I didn’t know much about running a website, much less a dating service. All I knew is it had to be done.

I searched around on the Internet and found some software for dating sites, and started the dating site that I am still running today. At first I didn’t charge for the site, it was free, people loved it and I received emails of thanks and success stories. Then I noticed there were some other sites starting to pop up for the same health niche, and they were charging for their services. I was pissed. How could they do this to me, to us, to this niche of people?

A Business is Born

Then I was introduced to the Nigerian Scammers. Someone emailed me telling me how they met someone on my site and they sent them money to come see them. As soon as the money arrived, they heard nothing from this person ever again. They said I was responsible for this loss of money and what was I going to do about it. Thus was born the FAQ about Internet dating scams and how to safely date on the Internet. And that’s when I decided to start charging for the dating site.

I implemented the “Paid” dating site. You couldn’t send messages to anyone unless you had a subscription. This was in part to help keep the scammers off the site and to keep legitimate users on. Then it happened, I received my first few payments and I had extra money in my pocket to spend. Maybe I could do this for a living? Maybe I should have been doing this all along?

Since that time, I’ve been running the site for 14 1/2 years now, and was making a few dollars per month with subscriptions, and almost $100 per month in AdSense income. Not a whole lot but it was something. I then started hanging out in a private forum for Yaro Staraks BlogMastermind group, and after talking to a few people about the site, I did some serious optimizations. I also implemented “Recurring” subscription payments, and the site now pulls in a modest $1,o00+ a month in subscriptions, AdSense, and affiliate sales. The income has become a large part of my monthly income and has been much needed since the demise of my I.T. company due to the economy. While I still run the site as a place for people looking for a safe haven to date, with this certain health issue, I look at it as a business now, and have for some time.

What’s a good Niche? Where to find a Good Niche?

Since then I have been hitting up various health care niches for income and affiliate sales. This is a prime example of what Alexis Dawes talks about in “Desperate Buyers Only“, find a niche where people are desperately seeking a solution to something socially embarrassing, health related or a fear. Once you have this you have a niche to explore. When people are embarrassed about Acne or some other related “Socially Visible” affliction, they seek out solutions, this is what we seek for niches, the same goes for health issues, cancer, diabetes or hepatitis. The same is true of fears and phobias.

And that, my friends, is how I got my start in online business.

Adversity, The Catalyst for Change and Success...

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March Income Report – A Watched Pot Never Boils

Larry C. — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 05:02:24 +0000

I’ve finally had a better month at making some good online income, and have spent less time on the computer doing it too. I’ve made some huge leaps and bounds and while my income has only gone up about 100$ since my last income report, I’ve also spent less time doing it. WAY LESS.

First off, I’ll be giving another review of Niche Profit Classroom, as I have used it for over six months now, and not earned a single dime from it. At least not the way they teach it. But I will review that in another post. I recommend it for people needing or wanting to learn about selling ebooks or other info products, but the way they teach it and the products they sell with the program are… crap. But again that’s for another post.

So I’ve been very busy and away from the computer and this blog for WAY TOO LONG, and I need to post to this blog more frequently. So my total for this month right off the top of my head is $1,356.91. My last report was 1,294.78. The difference as I said before is I spent way less time on the computer and online doing it this month than ever.

I listen to blog talk radio sometimes and ran across this program: Adsense Masters Course, which I liked what I was hearing. I make some good money from Google AdSense but what this guy was talking is so simple and I am wondering why I didn’t think about doing this months ago, because I KNOW that Google AdSense does work.

Basically you make a site which a keyword phrase and pull traffic to the site and people click on the AdSense. It’s all White hat, no black hat crap. Otherwise I wouldn’t do it and risk losing my AdSense account. I’ve also implemented my own little twist to it too: Amazon Affiliate Sales. I will be putting out my own PDF document Product on how I do this now because I have had a steady growing stream of revenue from both the Adsense and Amazon stuff, that I feel I have finally figured it out and found the magic ingredients.

I’ve also re-discovered the real secret behind marketing and sales online: TRAFFIC. If you have no traffic, you have no one to sell to. I’ve also figured out that for me, I need to blog and work on sites that I have an interest in what I am writing or selling. For instance, my site www.rockabillylifestyle.com, or my photography Website on Hollywood Glamour Photography: Darkmans Darkroom. Oh and you should have seen the jump in traffic when I blogged about Michelle Bombshell McGee, Jesse James Mistress( I almost Photographed her once). That was a hot topic. So was the death of Peter Gowland, The Pinup Legend.

Traffic is a big part of those sites and there is a lot of interest in those topics. So I will be putting together an eBook for my own product here shortly and will be giving it away for a week and then I will be charging for it once I get some feedback.

Ok so here is the lesson with small streams of income and traffic kids, please do try this at home.

I have this money tree, it was given to me by a close friend who couldn’t take care of it any longer and it was not doing to good. I put it in a larger pot, and fresh dirt, with some fertilizer and it took off. I’ve had it about 3-4 years. I recently started trimming it just before spring of the past two years. I do this to keep it groomed and to train it to grow the way I want it to grow. I also have this idea that if I nurture this little tree, it will bring me luck and money.

So each spring I trim it and feed it and watch the new leaves sprout, but you never really see it grow by watching it. Just as you don’t see a pot of water boil if you stand there and watch it, or it takes just too damn long. So this year I took some pictures to illustrate how little streams and online marketing will frustrate the hell out of you if you start there and watch it try to grow. It will just be very frustrating, which I found out.

Each day I would look at it, and see no real change, but between photographs, which were taken only days apart from each other over a period of 2-3 weeks, you can see the difference. Little streams start to gather momentum, and then join with other little streams to start forming a larger stream of income and then the next thing you know you have a nice chunk of change coming in. See the pictures below.

The Money Tree

Little Buds Starting

Little BudsTurn into Leaves

Little Leaves Grow into Bigger Leaves

Over time things mature and really take form

The pictures were taken over a period of a couple of weeks(2), and this is how I have experienced the growth of my online presence and income slowly growing and gathering momentum. If you sit there and try to watch each click, visitor or payment that comes to your site instead of focusing on Good Content, Driving traffic and being patient, you will NEVER see any light at the end of the tunnel.

Still with something for at least 6 months to 1 year before giving up on it.

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Income Report for October 2010

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