Am I on the right track? Advice greatly appreciated.

8 replies
Hey fellow WF members.

Quick background of myself. I first started getting into making money online when I was 12, almost 13. I've had an entrepreneurial mindset since I started out selling on eBay just as a fun little hobby to make some side cash at a young age. It eventually turned into something more serious and I was making almost a full time income from the ages of 15-18. Due to the increase in competition with ecommerce and getting busy with college, I stopped for the most part. Went to a community college for 2 years and graduated with a business administration degree. Went to a public college for another 4 years and graduated this past May (2015) with a bachelors in economics and a minor in business. I really have no interest working for someone else, unless it absolutely comes to that. After realizing how dumb college probably was, and that no one is just out there handing you high paying jobs (even with two college degrees, internships and decent experience) I started researching ways to make money online I would say about mid summer of this year. Fell in love with the concept of internet marketing and have been learning ever since.

Current situation I have a full years membership through Wealthy Affiliate (online university teaching internet marketing concepts). I also have a paid keyword analyzation tool. Started earlier in the year but truly started putting in real work on August 1st. I have a website up and running (teachmeresidual.com) through WordPress and I'm spending every day I can either learning new information, or writing/editing content. My niche, is teaching different ways to create an income online. I do have some traffic coming to the site, but a good portion of it I believe is spam (referral). My posts and pages are ranked and get indexed fast, but I'm usually ranked on pages 4-6 even though I've done my keyword research to target low competition. Even though I know I need to continue to build an 'authority site' and build search engines trusts. I'm starting to get overloaded with information with where I need to go next for monetization/advertising methods. Solo ads, media buys, email lists, pay per click, adwords, adsense, squeeze pages, opt in pages, etc etc I'm starting to feel lost in a sea of information and that I am in over my head.

Also, I'm starting to feel insecure about my ability to offer valuable information and provide solutions to others in this niche, considering I'm not a internet marketing guru making millions of dollars online. I also don't feel that I'm extremely talented at writing articles, selling to others, designing web page layouts etc.



My question is (in your opinion, I know this is extremely subjective) am I on the right track? Am I able to truly create an income online in this niche if I keep up what I'm doing? Where should I go from here to boost progress?
#advice #appreciated #greatly #internet marketing #track
  • Profile picture of the author discrat
    Hey hojsikm,

    If you were making close to a full time income with selling on Ebay as a teenager, why don't you create a "how to" product that you give steps on what you did to have Success on Ebay


    - Robert Andrew
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    • Profile picture of the author hojsikm
      Originally Posted by discrat View Post

      Hey hojsikm,

      If you were making close to a full time income with selling on Ebay as a teenager, why don't you create a "how to" product that you give steps on what you did to have Success on Ebay


      - Robert Andrew

      Thanks, for the input Robert! I have thought about that, and I have wrote a couple posts on my website on how to successfully sell on eBay, Amazon etc. However, ecommerce competition has skyrocketed since and personally I feel almost as a amateur in that regards since so much new information, techniques, methods etc have come out since I was really involved with selling products online.
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  • Profile picture of the author Jennifer Boyatt
    An email list is a must. There should be a place (form) on your front page for the people who are loving what you are doing to sign up for a "newsletter" or something. Of course then you have to figure out what kind of content you are going to share with your list, tips or share your blog posts, etc. Then every once in a while you will be able to share an offer (affiliate offer) to your list and if you've built the know-like-trust factor, then you potentially have a great income there.

    It's no secret that the "make money" "niche" is very broad and a lot of people are contributing. But there is always the opportunity to make your unique stamp and to stand out from the rest.
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    • Profile picture of the author hojsikm
      Originally Posted by Jennifer Boyatt View Post

      An email list is a must. There should be a place (form) on your front page for the people who are loving what you are doing to sign up for a "newsletter" or something. Of course then you have to figure out what kind of content you are going to share with your list, tips or share your blog posts, etc. Then every once in a while you will be able to share an offer (affiliate offer) to your list and if you've built the know-like-trust factor, then you potentially have a great income there.

      It's no secret that the "make money" "niche" is very broad and a lot of people are contributing. But there is always the opportunity to make your unique stamp and to stand out from the rest.
      Thank you Jennifer for the advice. I have since added an email opt in form to the sidebar of my site with Mail chimp, and I also added an incentive for people to sign up with a free report. I still need to write out my drip campaigns, or figure out if I want to alert them of my new blog posts, but that will hopefully come to me in time as my list builds.
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  • Profile picture of the author nicolasmd2112
    Like so many others you are suffering from information overload. It's almost like you've learned too much lol, and this is why you feel as if your being pulled in so many directions.

    But when it comes to online business man (or any business for that matter) it's a black and white concept. (Which i'm sure you're all too familiar with having gone to college for business).

    There's success and there's failure and nothing in-between. You need to pick something you know a lot about, like eCommerce, and hit it hard. Stop wasting time trying to find the perfect niche, market, or method, and just DO SOMETHING. Get the ball rolling, and make adjustments as needed. Mistakes will be made and failures will happen, it's inevitable.

    Make everyday a productive one, and wake up every morning wanting to succeed as bad as you want to breathe. I'm just like you, I hate the idea of someone being my 'boss', having to kiss ass, and brown nose my way to the top. Why would I want to do that when I can be the one at the top?

    Good luck.
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    • Profile picture of the author hojsikm
      Originally Posted by nicolasmd2112 View Post

      Like so many others you are suffering from information overload. It's almost like you've learned too much lol, and this is why you feel as if your being pulled in so many directions.

      But when it comes to online business man (or any business for that matter) it's a black and white concept. (Which i'm sure you're all too familiar with having gone to college for business).

      There's success and there's failure and nothing in-between. You need to pick something you know a lot about, like eCommerce, and hit it hard. Stop wasting time trying to find the perfect niche, market, or method, and just DO SOMETHING. Get the ball rolling, and make adjustments as needed. Mistakes will be made and failures will happen, it's inevitable.

      Make everyday a productive one, and wake up every morning wanting to succeed as bad as you want to breathe. I'm just like you, I hate the idea of someone being my 'boss', having to kiss ass, and brown nose my way to the top. Why would I want to do that when I can be the one at the top?

      Good luck.
      Thanks Nicolas, this was good advice!!

      I definitely have been feeling the information overload. I do like ecommerce and know to a certain extent some about it but honestly I love internet marketing/affiliate marketing much more.

      I just hope I'm able to learn fast enough so I can also create some value in this niche. I'm not rushing it by any means, but being a college kid that just spend 6 years in school, I can't really afford to spend much more time before I start earning some sort of an income. I've been putting in 8-12 hour days since august 1st and earned maybe 10 bucks online lol. I'm willing to keep this going as long as possible, I just know if I get sucked into a job due to expenses, that will allow me to only put in a small amount of time into my online career.
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  • Profile picture of the author eugenedm
    Well you got to get it straight man...

    Just Read the book "Start with Why"...
    And then ask yourself: "WHY?" do you want to achieve what you want to achieve....

    If you still confused ask me, but I think YOU have the answer to SUCCESS and only YOU!

    Gene Adam
    Signature

    WARNING: A 50 Million Dollar Man Taught Me His Secret... Which Resulted 6,000 Sign-ups on My Email List.

    "It's easier than you think..."

    => Watch this video here...
    Build Your List to 6,000 Subscribers

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    • Profile picture of the author hojsikm
      Originally Posted by eugenedm View Post

      Well you got to get it straight man...

      Just Read the book "Start with Why"... Start with why -- how great leaders inspire action | Simon Sinek | TEDxPugetSound - YouTube

      And then ask yourself: "WHY?" do you want to achieve what you want to achieve....

      If you still confused ask me, but I think YOU have the answer to SUCCESS and only YOU!

      Gene Adam
      Thanks for the video, Eugene! I'm a firm believer in knowing your 'why'. Look forward to seeing what this guy has to say! Thanks for the comment
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10255788].message }}

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