When to know to give up

Well like the first person said, check and make sure you are sending good traffic.

Also, if you are to the point that you feel like you are never going to get anywhere with your site, even with hard work, then make a new one and do things differently this time around.

If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got.

Don't say that, that site of yours express who you are. You dedicate and exerted all your effort and spent too much time to make it possible so why give up now? All you have to do is believe on what you can do and keep on enhancing your site, yours might not as popular as the other but the thing is you are able to share your ideas to people worldwide thru your site

Never give up...With IM you learn new things very single day if you are committed enough...If it's not happening right now don't give up completely, research what you can to improve and make your business better...Unless you are at a dead end completely don't throw in the towel...From my experience I have been on the verge of quitting a specific project and most of the projects I have almost quit are making me money now...My advice is try to keep it going no matter how hopeless it seems...

Hmm...maybe you need to take a step back and look at the site with an analytical mind. Can always ask for criticism here and we might be able to point you in the right direction as to where you've "gone wrong". Can't keep doing the same thing and expect different results, maybe take another approach.

That is a pretty good domain name. Make the site a little slicker, drive some traffic and you could probably sell it off for a decent price.

Get out - but don't give up.

Mahlon

You must consider that you are consistent in many ways. Obcourse the most important is you have a best strategy to solve any kind of problem.

Be a "how" thinker not an "if" thinker!

(?)

Well, although greatness will come to those who persevere.... you should also learn when to cut your losses..... If you think you could be spending your time doing something better, or if you have no more love for your site, then maybe its time to move on.

That is a pretty cool site. BuddyPress is great isn't it?

I think your layout, concept, and content is really cool. Plus your domain is solid. I think what would be extremely helpful for this website is easier navigation. By that I mean putting your reviews into Categories so that visitors can easily navigate. Here is why that would be very helpful.

Let's say I go to your website and I am looking for laptop reviews. The first page I may see one but then have to scroll through every other review page just to find another laptop review. If they were divided into categories where I could click "Laptop/Computer Reviews" then I would much rather stay on the site and look through different reviews.

I think that would be a great way to improve it. Do NOT give up on the website because it does have a lot of potential. Keep on improving, work on your SEO, gain traffic, and work on creating some revenue. If you need help and would like some ideas, let me know via PM and I will gladly give you some time. Good luck!

Hey fellow Raleighite I love the idea of your website I thinking of doing something similar. I would try to start a promotion of something like win 100 dollars for submitting the best review and then go to contests and sweepstakes blogs and submit your promotion you should get a ton of traffic that way

Roadblocks are what you see when you take your eyes off your goal. The only way to lose in this game is to give up. Thats what most everyone does, they quit when it gets hard. If this is what you want to do, then do it, and stop thinking about weather you should quit or not. Just continue until it works, anyway hope you dont quit, i have been in your place, and though I am new on this fourm I am not new to building businesses. Its always hard at first, just keep up your great work, and change you tatics- it will happen for you!!!

For a person to really attain his goal, he should never give up on something that he desires. You have to have focus on where you want to go, and make sure to follow your plan. Like what warrior jasonrae had said, people will encounter roadblocks if they will take their eyes off the road. Just as you are into your IM business, if you take your focus off on the business, you will just be surprised to be facing some hindrances or roadblocks.
I would also agree on the idea mentioned above that it is better to use "room for improvement" than "give up". Once you give up, then that is over for you and better change or look for something else to work on. But by improving on what you already learn, it is challenging yourself to do more than quitting, because if you quit, like I said, then it's over.
It's what my other people would tell us, never give up on things that we should do. The idea of knowing when to give up is basically the idea of just quitting on something that a person might think that there's nothing he can do about it. It's like no matter what you do, no matter how hard you try, things didn't go in your way and it's about time to raise the white flag. But still, try to face the challenge before thinking of quitting.

I'm not an expert but I'm churning out my own batches of amazon review sites. I see several fundamental problems with your website.

1) No Niche - your oldest few post were reviews about music equipment, but then you spread into nachos, potato chips, laptops, hosting, and iced tea. Pick one of those (probably the laptops or music equipment) and laser focus.

2) No way to make money off your customers. When I pull up a review, I see no affiliate links to the product that I'd like to buy. Even if I liked your potato chip review, I couldn't buy any from your website or even click an ad somewhere to learn more.

3) No advertising above the fold - I see one adsense advertisement and it is about 2 screens down on the right hand. Above the fold, or the first screen you see when your page loads up is by far the best place to throw an ad or two. My ads above the fold are the best performers across all of my websites.

4) Articles - You're a better website than some in this regard that you'll talk down on products as well instead of just hyping them up. However, you leave no alternative. For example in your "HostBig" review, you speak of how terrible they are but nowhere do you give an alternative. Even if you do build some trust and focus from your viewers, you're not providing them with an answer to your problem (your host).

5) Theme - I don't think your theme is the best for what you're trying to do. Lots of empty space that is all gray. Squeeze the page a bit and add a little more color. Design a nice logo. Colorful graphics grabs eyes.

Sorry if I'm a bit direct, I just wanted to give ya a good checklist of where to start. All fixable - look at the people's pages that are doing better than you. Why is that so. Emulate or even better improve upon.

Your site actually looks pretty cool but I think there's an issue with the products you featured on your homepage. I see laptops, musical instruments, and then...chips? Perhaps you could remove feature reviews. create one kick-ass and categorize the products in your sidebar.