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Share businesses you ditched, here are mine.

by dad2four
7 replies
So lets talk about those "businesses" or income sources that you got working but decided not to pursue.

There is only so much time in a day. We have to spend our time focusing on the ones that make us the most money in the least amount of time for the most part. Sometimes this means ditching lower quality income steams to move to greener pastures.

I'll skip the silly ones like mowing grass as a kid, although I wonder if I could have turned that into an empire. After all, I know of a corporate guy that left his executive big wig position to build an empire in the window cleaning business.

I've created a few niche style websites that used Google Adsense to generate their income. They never pulled in a ton although there were very steady and reliable. I left them in the end because I didn't want to rely on Google for my money. I feared my traffic drying up and/or my adsense account being banned.

I'd love to hear about the endeavors you had success with but they weren't high enough producers so you bailed on em.
#businesses #ditched #mine #share
  • Profile picture of the author Marked09
    I used to do Paid to Click and Paid to Survey the concept is really simple but when I learned more about Internet Marketing. I Immediately ditched those. I decided to play big instead of clicking for cents.

    Looking back. I'm glad I did
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    • Profile picture of the author Steve B
      The first thought that came to my mind was - "How do you know what went wrong with the business?"

      The suggestion that you bailed on business leads one to believe that it was a bad niche, the business model was wrong, or that somehow others shouldn't be trying the same thing.

      In actuality, the only problem might have been that the marketer did nothing to promote his business.

      I guess I'm wondering what relevance this thread has to anyone's ability to make good in a business that someone else trashes?

      There are so many personal and business variables that lead to success or failure . . . I'm thinking it would be a shame for someone to abandon their business because they read in a forum that someone else had no success doing the same thing.

      Steve
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      Steve Browne, online business strategies, tips, guidance, and resources
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      • Profile picture of the author dad2four
        Originally Posted by Steve B View Post

        The suggestion that you bailed on business leads one to believe that it was a bad niche, the business model was wrong, or that somehow others shouldn't be trying the same thing.

        In actuality, the only problem might have been that the marketer did nothing to promote his business.

        Surely you are aware that every business is not the best you can be in correct?

        You only have so much time to spend and surely you want to spend it on the most efficient, profitable business you can yes?

        Business get sold off all the time, profitable ones in fact. they get sold off sometimes because the owner figures out a better business to be in or because this one isn't any fun and he/she wants to try something else. Heck General Electric just sold off their Appliance division to Electrolux.

        The question does not in any way assume that someone got rid of the business because some element was bad. In fact, the ones I'd love to hear about are the ones that were discarded because they found something better.

        Originally Posted by Steve B View Post

        I guess I'm wondering what relevance this thread has to anyone's ability to make good in a business that someone else trashes?
        Perhaps others could learn from the discussion of why someone moved on from a business before they do the same. Or perhaps someone will read about a discarded business and decide that's the business for them!!
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  • Profile picture of the author miklanderson2
    Let's see...I've tried so many different angles in the online marketing world that I'm sure I'm going to miss some here.

    I started off writing articles for $5 to $10 per article. I made a little money, but soon realized there's a lot more money to be made writing content for myself. Around the same time, I also tried taking surveys for money, but soon realized it wasn't going to be as lucrative as the sites selling the information on taking surveys made it sound.

    I went on to create a number of Adsense and Amazon Affiliate sites. Those sites had potential, but I followed bad advice and hammered the sites with a ton of unrelated backlinks in an attempt to get them on the first page of Google. They made it and I made decent money for a short period of time before I got slapped by a Google animal update and lost all of my rankings. Instead of trying to rebuild or recover the sites, I decided to dump most of them and try a different angle.

    I still have a small handful of these sites that I haven't touched in years. They're ugly and are thin on content, but they still make a couple hundred bucks a year, so I've left them up.

    At one point in time, I wanted to buy toys and other collectible items for low prices offline and resell them online. I managed to find a number of great deals and built up a large collection, but when it came time to pull the trigger and sell them, I realized I enjoyed being a collector more than I would enjoy selling the items and I now have a loft in my house dedicated to my collection.

    Luckily, I have an understanding and loving wife who enjoys collecting cool stuff almost as much as I do!

    I moved on to the Kindle marketplace and have managed to carve out a nice little income from Kindle and Createspace books, but have found myself drifting away from that marketplace as well. I'm still adding books to the Kindle marketplace, but aren't investing the same amount of time into it that I was in the beginning.

    It isn't because I haven't been successful there...I just want to diversify and don't want all of my eggs in one basket.
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    "A bargain is something you don’t need at a price you can’t resist."
    -Franklin Jones

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  • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
    Banned
    Originally Posted by dad2four View Post

    I know of a corporate guy that left his executive big wig position to build an empire in the window cleaning business.
    Funny you should say that: I've been thinking for years, every time I pay the window-cleaner what seems like quite a lot of money for the very small amount of time he spends at my house, that the window-cleaning business must be nearly as profitable as dentistry (and that's really saying something), if you get it right.

    Originally Posted by dad2four View Post

    I left them in the end because I didn't want to rely on Google for my money.
    Must be good thinking, in principle: Google-dependence for primary traffic is a huge potential weakness for any online business, I think?

    Originally Posted by dad2four View Post

    I'd love to hear about the endeavors you had success with but they weren't high enough producers so you bailed on em.
    I didn't even "have success" in the first place, with my own early endeavors. Early on, I tried some over-ambitious and poorly-defined niches, tried to use article directories to attract traffic (), and so on. Described here.

    I also picked all the wrong products to promote from ClickBank, imagining that "high gravity" indicated that affiliates were selling them successfully.

    Nobody was born knowing how to do this stuff.

    .
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    • Profile picture of the author dad2four
      Originally Posted by Alexa Smith View Post

      Funny you should say that: I've been thinking for years, every time I pay the window-cleaner what seems like quite a lot of money for the very small amount of time he spends at my house, that the window-cleaning business must be nearly as profitable as dentistry (and that's really saying something), if you get it right.
      His company is Fish Window Cleaning - Window Cleaning - Window Washing - Home and it's eaning him millions. I ran out to see if I could find you his story Alexa to no avail, but in the process I see that he is now offering franchises.

      Whodathunkit?
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  • Profile picture of the author Marked09
    I left my old method of making money online for the following reasons:

    1.) I was not building my own business. I was building the business of other people. Yes I make some money and I will be making more money If I continue doing that but I realized that I was not in control.

    If something goes wrong or one major change on their system will bring my income down or worse to zero. That's why I started building a more sustainable model.

    2.) PTC is very straight forward, you just need to invest some money, put up a banner and recruit some leads and you'll get paid easily. However this business is not very scale able model. You invest $1k dollars and you earn $100 - 200 in return compared if you have a real business model, with the right funnel for every $1 spend you'll get $5,$10,$100 in return no cielling as long as you test your funnel very well.
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