First Year in IM: Quit Job, Travel World

There's no time like New Year's Eve to wax philosophical about where you and your business headed. As of this time last year I:

worked two full time jobs (travel agent by day, waiter by night)
engaged, and really worried about paying for the wedding
lost, confused, depressed, etc.

You get the point.

Fast forward a year: my wife and I both gave notice last week to our employers. We have a one way ticket to Bangkok, and will spend 2009 traveling the world, while continuing to build our businesses, which will provide automatic income for years.

Here's a brief recap:

In January, I had a MILLION DOLLAR IDEA that would catapult us into the upper echelon of wealth, power and prestige.

I was so excited about it, I quit my night job and created a 50 page e-book, software, and three audio CD's and sold them via Adwords.

Millionaire? Hardly. It made a couple hundred bucks a month.

I would have made more money sticking with the restaurant, wearing a lousy bow tie and serving overpriced food. Internet Marketing took an immense amount of time to build, and offered a trickle of additional income. All in all, it really wasn't worth it.

Or was it? I learned a lot from that product, including a solid understanding of Adwords, list building, split testing, and automation.

The fact is, that stupid website my wife (yep, we tied the knot last month) and I put together is still earning a few hundred dollars a month on complete autopilot.

We duplicated this process with another product, with similar results.

Then, we took this newfound knowledge and freelanced as an Adwords specialist (me) and a web designer (my wife). This led to teaching an internet marketing class at a local community college (and an agreement to set up their adwords campaign).

All in all, the offline work brought in just over $2,300.

Again, there wasn't a TON of money rolling in. But that's not the point.

The point is that we were taking ACTION. And this is where many fellow Warriors can relate...

We spend hours on this forum, discussing methods and strategies. We check email several times a day. We "calculate" our future earnings, without taking the time to MAKE IT HAPPEN TODAY.

I've recently created another website that is currently bringing in $100/month. Not riches, but it's still money in my pocket that I don't have to work for. Furthermore, the $500 a month we're making on auto pilot will go pretty far in Thailand, India, Nepal, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam...

I have to thank so many Warriors here for contributing to my modest success this first year, such as Xfactor, Steve Waggenheim, and Allen Graves. There's a large percentage of us here who fall between the "newbies" and the "gurus." We do OK online, and are still learning the ropes.

Over time, you start to develop your own style... your own business models... and over time, you realize your own success.

Success boils down to two equal ingredients:

Knowledge
Action

They're like breathing: in order to stay alive, you have to do both, and in equal proportions. Too many people (myself included) focus on learning new skills, and forget to actually put those skills to use.

In other words, LEARN something today, and DO something today. You'll see results, I promise.

Have a sit down with your partner (or yourself, if need be) and ask yourself what you want out of next year. Then figure out what you can give people next year to make it happen.

Thank you Warriors, and have a fantastic 2009!