If you were Starting Over?

The first thing to do is gain some clarity. Results vary based on previous business, experience, etc.

this is an easy one I wouldn't do anything different since it worked so well.

I would choose a niche one of the biggest and most popular, I would research all the problems people were having in that niche. I would do that for a few hours.

I would subscribe to every list possible to see what my competition is doing. that way I could do something a little different to stand out.

I would give all my research to an writer and have them create me some content, maybe about 50 pages worth.

I would turn some of that content in a few free videos to give away to people who join my list. the videos would be filled with covert sales and persuasion techniques and also very good content based on the 4 most common problems.

I would turn the rest of the content into a cheap $27-$47 audio product to promote through the videos.

I would deliver the videos over the course of 4 days using optimize press. I would then create 10 email follow ups to deliver every day for 4 days.

Then I would begin a ppc campaign, using msn adcenter and yahoo and set a $500 dollar a month budget since they don't charge you until you use the $500 buying me some time.

Then I would setup a blog based all on very effective keyword research, I would create a youtube video out of that video optimized of course, then I would post that video on a blog and summarize it in the blog post all optimized for the same keyword.

Then I would rewrite that article two times and use unique article wizard to build backlinks to the youtube video, the blog post it's on and the main domain.

and tada I'm back in business gaining an income, then I would just keep doing that until I had around 30 sites all making $1,000 a month each.

Each site only takes around 4 hour a month to upkeep so I would hire back the people I had to fire when I got wiped out to take care of all the sites for me.

I wouldn't wait 12 years to start building a list. That's for DAMN sure! Had I gotten serious way back then and spent the bulk of my time on building a list and working to develop a trust relationship with the members, I'd be writing this from my private island or on my yacht instead of my home office in Texas.

I been to this situation before (not in IM business) and I can tell you that once you get some steady cash flow running to your pocket and you know that it's not some kind of a luck but that it's been made thanks to your efforts and brains, you would never be crashed by anything. Whenever life kicks you, you just put yourself together and get back to the race and that's it.

I'd completely ignore everything I did for the first 3 months and start in month 4 (when I "re-started").

I'd put less time and effort into making such nice-looking websites.

I'd start building lists at an even earlier stage than I actually did.

I'd probably have 7 single opt-in lists and one confirmed opt-in instead of 5 single opt-in and 3 confirmed opt-in.

I'd never look at any very high gravity Clickbank product or any with a vendor's opt-in on the sales page at all (I wasted some real time and effort that way until I learned better).

I'd never try to spin any article at all, and never use mass article directory submission (thankfully I learned these pretty quickly anyway).

I wouldn't have to bother doing all my split-testing of squeeze pages and landing pages, and all the other testing I've done, because I'd know the results already.

I would probably have gotten into different things sooner. I have done just about every method from adsense to cpa to domain names to offline. Each has made me some money. Adsense still makes me a buck or two every day from a site I built two months ago. CPA offers made me about 50-100 bucks. Domain names have made me quite a bit. Offline I have just gotten into and landed someone for a VERY GOOD amount.

Experiment with all that you want and then choose something you like and build a business.