The worst thing I ever did.

by 41 replies
43
Greetings Warriors, I have something to tell you that might change your perspective on what you are already currently doing to make money. I hope that this single piece of advice helps you so that you can succeed.

But first, let's start off with a short story...

Back in 2010, I discovered an EMD domain name for a niche that only had about 3 authority websites, literally no competition. I bought it, set up a quick website with 2 pages of content and let it sit. I forget about the site and move on. Six months later I remember the site and was shocked to see it was making 5000 UV daily! I immediately revamped the site and added a bunch of hand generated content. The revenue started to come in and I was riding the gravy train. Sometime in 2011, I thought it would be "cool" to show off my success. I posted a thread on another website similar to this one with screenshots, method, and very sensitive details. I thought to myself, heck, no one is going to do what I am doing. Shortly after created this thread, literally a few short weeks, the niche became heavily saturated, and everyone was doing the same thing. Traffic dropped and the gravy train was no more.

To this day I regret ever doing what I did.

Moral of the story? Never reveal your niche/method. Period. Why would you want to have more competition if what you are doing is working already?

Anyways, I hope this helps someone.

Cheers.
#main internet marketing discussion forum #day #haunting #thing #worst
  • Wow, that's a lesson. My worst thing was when I was ranking high for keywords such "free MMORPG", etc ... my game was getting 500 unique visitors a day. The game sucked and design was terrible. I should have revamped it, optimised for sign ups, added a better VIP system and turned it into a money maker. I don't really regret that I didn't do it, I just think that it could have been a great money maker especially when gaming was my passion back in a day. It was 2011-2012. And browser games take a lot of time for maintaining it and updating it ...
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  • What you did may not have been good business sense but it is quite natural
    to want to share your success story with others. Maybe you should have
    charged for the information.

    I had a similar experience when I first started out online, but I asked in a
    forum if people would find my method valuable and most said yes, so
    I wrote my first ebook and charged $10 for it, then eventually $37. It made
    over $100,000.

    My big mistake was to ghostwrite an internet marketing ebook that propelled
    the author to internet stardom and I got no recognition for it because I was
    just the ghostwriter. We learn from our mistakes.

    -Ray Edwards
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  • IM 101.

    AgentK, I'm sorry to hear about that, but at least you learned a valuable lesson.

    - Tom
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  • It happens. Just be happy with what you're doing and stay humble. Do not reveal your money making secrets. People are jealous and will eventually steal your methods.
    Remember, you can always start again.

    Kind regards,
    Yosheena
    • [ 1 ] Thanks
  • I remember doing the same mistake back in 2008 and I even have a few local designer friends who are now my competitors in that niche We all want to help each other but sometimes we better not give away all our tools and tricks since there is a learning curve and people need to work to get there. Thanks for the post...
    • [ 1 ] Thanks
    • [1] reply
    • It's definitely a fine line. You want to contribute to the Community of a Forum but yet you do not want to give the whole Cat and Condom away.

      I've seem many noble members here giving stuff to try to help (or maybe impress) others . Detailing their successes right down to the most nitty gritty detail.

      Never quite understood that. But to each his own


      - Robert Andrew
      • [ 3 ] Thanks
  • Of course, there is a compromise here.

    You can help the community with good information and not reveal your niche...
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    • [2] replies
    • Banned
      Hi My friend Jack

      How are you brother ,hope everything is fine

      wish you happy holidays in advance
      Chyanit
      • [ 1 ] Thanks
    • Very true, Jack. Reveal the method/process/technique, just not the niche.

      Btw, love your avatar. Pulp Fiction is one of my top 3 favorite movies! I wish there was a Jack Rabbit Slims, lol! I'd be there every day!

      Cheers,

      Tony.
      • [ 1 ] Thanks
  • Good advice. People want to share (brag?) about their success and only to get copied and cheated out of it instead.
    I'm all for giving honest advice and tips, but always leave out sensitive information that could be used by the competition.
    I remember a thread long ago on another forum where banners was discussed and I had made a banner, really amateurish and homemade style because I'm not a designer. But the image and catchphrase really worked and it got my highest CTR of all times. Ofcourse people asked me to post it but I refused as I knew it would be stolen.
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  • I hear what you're saying. But, here's the thing: that was 2011. Time to let it go mate.

    Internet Marketing is like panning for gold. Sure you had your mind taken over by wanting to share success which is perfectly natural. But, there are more nuggets & mines out there for you!

    Keep working. You struck well then you'll strike well again... once you let go of 2011.

    Good luck!
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  • My own experience, right here on the WF, is very similar. I responded to a thread to suggest something I was doing to monetize one of my sites but I didn't give away what that site was. Several Warriors asked in the thread if they could see an example of my model.

    I was pretty new here and so I responded and offered to share.

    I don't think a week went by before my entire site had been copied by at least two other Warriors (that I knew of). My sales letter was even copied word-for-word on one of the copycat sites.

    I learned my lesson . . . sadly.

    Steve
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  • Brother, I hear you. I use to have a niche that was very narrow. Well, it was making approx $400 per month on average. That is not a lot of money. Still, I gave the secret away. Sadly, I currently make from that web site about $5 per month now. Lesson to learn is do not give away your crown gems. Few people will understand the amount of work that went into creating the web site from which they steal pictures, text, videos even. Fact is, they even copy my grammar errors.
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  • That's alright. They say the second million is faster than the first. Dust yourself off, start in a new niche, and duplicate what you did to make your first site successful.
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    • [1] reply
    • I don't think it's necessarily bad to share that you're doing well in a specific niche, but would say you definitely made a mistake by sharing all the details of exactly what you did.

      Anyways consider it just another lesson learned. There's nothing stopping you from finding another niche and doing it again smarter!
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  • Sorry to hear that man. I recommend not giving all your secrets away especially when you are giving every single little detail that helped you become successful.

    I would imagine though if something is a little complicated and still requires some work that most people wouldn't go through with it. There's plenty of WSO's and other products in different niches(weight loss for example) where there is a plan completely written out for them and the people still never take any action on it.
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  • Sure you make a cost analysis on how much you could lose by sharing your method and then only share if you think you could make more than that amount charging for your method?
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  • Banned
    Tip: Never share your bank account pin number with other people.

    Tell all your friends...
    • [ 1 ] Thanks
    • [2] replies

    • Wait! Do I not reveal my bank account pin number or tell it to all my friends? I'm so confused!!!
      • [2] replies
    • share your pin number w all your friends? cool
  • Sorry about that happening man. Hopefully you now have a better understanding of what you did wrong and will continue to make profit without telling future niches.
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  • That's really sad but I guess it's the nature of the game. Everyone out to make money. Never tell all, always leave something for yourself. Nevertheless, I'm sure you will soar higher in future projects and probably already are. So good luck.
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  • As a business man, you have to evaluate the risk of
    what your sharing.

    For example, I risk absolutely nothing sharing what
    I do because it's a multi-billion dollar market (trading)

    What I do is independent of what others do so I
    have the freedom to not only earn as much as I
    want but teach as many as I want without threat
    of competition.

    If, however, I had a niche website online. There
    is no way I would share, brag or boast about it.

    Not to be mean, but recognizing that there are
    people who will steal your work, run with it or
    emulate it so they can get their piece of the pie
    you worked hard to discover or put together.

    This is one major reason why I stopped buying
    other peoples methods, WSO's, systems, etc. b/c
    9 times out of 10, what they're teaching you they
    are teaching others for a fee because either they
    don't do it anymore themselves or it doesn't work
    as well for themselves.

    Better to sell off all the parts of a dead cow before
    it goes to slaughter then waste any bit of it.

    From a human point of view, people reveal their
    stuff for ego reasons and/or share the wealth reasons.

    But, as a business person, there are just some things
    we can't do if you want to keep your edge in business.
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    • I've also noticed that when I buy a course that says that it's over the shoulder and they reveal all, they don't. I think I've reached the point where I'm done buying because I know, I just need to do.

      And to the original poster, it sucks. One of those lessons learned. I often give away too much when talking with potential clients and they think they can do it themselves. Or they take it to someone else and get a better quote. It's a skill.

      • [1] reply
    • This is very good advice.

      I bought an ebook from this forum a few days ago and it really is just like what you explained.
      They are just releasing the technique out in the open for everyone and everyone will just copy the idea and flood the internet with similar non-original content.
  • Thanks for the share!

    Many times, we are not aware of something until we experience it or learn of someone else's experience about it. Although as many warriors say, sharing good info in itself is not something bad, but now you know in some instances you will need to have a limit in order not to compromise the success of your business.
  • This is the unfortunate part about things like case studies, everyone tends to just copy it instead of taking the theory and methods behind it to create something of their own..
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    • Your mistake here you didn't progress faster than people you had taught. They simply worked harder and faster than you.

      I mean how many one tried to replicate Facebook since 2007 and couldn't catch up with Mark (G+ as an example) ? All ideas are available , you have to work harder and faster than your competition.
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  • Yes..that is BIG lesson you have learned, that's a problem in the IM niche. People love to copy instead of coming up with there own version of doing things.
  • When I first joined I got in an Adwords discussion and mentioned a 10/10 campaign I had running for almost a year. I made the mistake of mentioning my keywords! Less then 24 hours later my CPC had tripled and the keywords were no longer profitable.

    There are people who troll this and other forums every day, looking for people to give up profitable "secrets." That's their "business model."

    Keep that in mind!
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  • second rule: success gets copied.

    upward and onward.
  • This is the reason that I never mention my niches and sites anywhere because once they are leaked out, it is not profitable.
  • Sooner or later someone would have find out your niche and copied it etc

    I know . I have had people copy me without even me revealing my gold mine.

    You have to copy and refinTVe.. replicate your niches yoself.. instead.. double your gold mine .. before others can.

    Simple!

    Why cry over spilt milk?
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    • If you're doing something that can be copied that easily, it's not worth posting about anyway - it's not you being successful, it's a fluke.

      I talk to my competitors all the time about what I do. They're all too lazy to do anything, and what I do is difficult enough that no one's going to knock me off in two weeks.

      In fact, I was just featured in an industry (my industry) magazine article where I talked about how to do what I do. One of the other people they interviewed talked about how they got into the business - via me. back in about 2008 I had emailed 1000 of my competitors with an offer of $500 for a website and an ebook on how I did what I did. 5 people bought. 1 person - the one they interviewed - actually followed through and is now successfully in my niche. The other 999? yeah, not too worried about those guys.

      Moral? Don't build your business on knock-off websites unless you're prepared to be knocked off. The biggest barrier to entry is just hard work.
  • I actually had mentioned this a a few times on this forum.

    There is absolutely no reason why anyone would let anyone know how they make their living. Why would they? We all have to eat.

    That's why I can honestly say that there really isn't much to learn on this forum. You will learn more doing hands on and studying others. You'll probably learn more of what not to do/do on the forum black hat world. That's just a fact. This place is gossip central.

    I wanted to start a thread with a case study of how to do niche sites so that noobs can actually hop on board. Guess what, that thread was removed. An honest thread to help people in a random niche.

    Here's the bottom line - everyone has their methods. Noobs will learn new methods as will the more advanced. The truth is, once you rank top 10 - we will all see what you're doing and how you're doing it. That goes with ASM also and selling on Amazon.
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    • There's one lesson I learned.

      If your business can be copied by others easily, then it's probably not a good business to begin with. Because you'll need to guard the secret so closely and chances are, since it's online, it's going be known. It's just a matter of time.

      I always ask my friend whenever he has a business idea. "What would you do if someone copies your website exactly?"
  • I think almost everyone can relate to your story. All of us somehow have been taken advantage of or have been tricked by people we've helped. We do not blame ourselves for helping out. Every bad thing happens for a reason and we just have to learn from these experiences and make this a part of improving ourselves.
  • This is a lesson for people.Importen reading.
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    The worst thing I ever did.

    Greetings Warriors, I have something to tell you that might change your perspective on what you are already currently doing to make money. I hope that this single piece of advice helps you so that you can succeed. But first, let's start off with a short story...