Two Milestones Reached! The Start Of A New Year And Thanks To The WF!
As 2011 came to a close, I finally reached TWO important milestones in my business. I came really close the last few months but ultimately crossed over at the end of December.
I had my first "X" figure month and also reached "X" figures for the year. I won't discuss exact dollar amounts because that's not my style but it was cool to see this happen and all this from selling two little ebooks in the dating niche.
I remember back in 2008 when I finished my first ebook. A few days after putting it online, I got my first sale. At that point I realized the possibilities and that you CAN make money on the Internet!
Fast forward to now, and it's getting hard to keep up with all the sales that come in some days... I still use Excel as my only record keeping mechanism and may have to switch to something else soon.
The amazing thing about this is it's all mostly profit as I have almost NO overhead and I outsource nothing, other than website graphics. (I'm not much of an artsy guy so thank god for those nerdy graphics guys.) I only have a handful of affiliates who makes sales and I run everything myself.
Yah, and I still have my day job to deal with on top of all this.
Of course joining the Warrior Forum and following the great advice offered by so many valuable members here has helped me considerably.
My business is basically on autopilot right now and to anyone new starting out, I'd like to offer some tips.
The following is what worked and did NOT work for me. That doesn't mean it will work for you but take from it what you must:
What worked:
1) Deciding to enter a niche that I'm already passionate about and have extensive knowledge. I don't think I would have kept at it if I was writing about stuff I don't care about.
2) Starting a blog and consistently putting in quality content. I found that various blog posts were ranking high for good keywords and this happened almost accidentally in most cases.
3) Running PPC campaigns on Google Adwords, at least for a time. It helps to find a training course on this subject as you can really lose money if you don't know what you're doing.
4) Running a CPM campaign on a website where extremely targeted leads are already hanging out. This really helped me build my list more quickly. And it didn't cost a whole lot either.
5) Putting out a really high quality ebook! My refund rate is less than 2% and I rarely get any negative feedback about either of my ebooks. I made sure they were top notch and spent a ton of time creating them.
6) Putting a lot of effort into excellent customer support. I check emails like five times a day and always get back to customers right away. It's appreciated and will help your business in the long run.
7) Following the advice of certain WF members. After being around here for a while, I was able to figure out who knew their stuff and who did not.
8) Moving my websites to Wordpress. Best thing I ever did! It wasn't too difficult to learn WP, but once I switched over, my rankings improved for lots of different keywords.
9) Getting rid of cumbersome Ebook software that produces EXE files and moving to PDF ebooks. Initially, I was way too concerned about people stealing my work and was focusing too much energy on it. Eventually I ditched the old software and went to PDF ebooks and sales did not suffer at all. In fact, they went up and customer support issues went down.
10) Working hard, setting goals and sticking to them! It always helps if you have a plan and take things one step at a time. This is HIGHLY Recommended!
What did NOT work:
1) Any and EVERY method that involves taking shortcuts or trying to cheat the search engines. I didn't do a lot of them but none that I did try really worked.
2) Submitting my website or articles to a gazillion article directories and hoping for instant traffic. Yes, I used some of those auto submitters but they often didn't work very well and my results were non existent.
3) Buying traffic from those websites that promise to blast your email to millions of "targeted" customers. Tried this once and spent $200 and got NO leads or additional sales. They are a total scam and it's a shame they are allowed to operate freely.
4) Trying to copy other gurus or others who claim to be "killing it" with their "method." Yes there are some gurus out there who have good stuff but I found that a lot of their methods didn't work well for me. There came a point where I realized I had to focus on things that will work "just for me."
5) Spending too much time in the War Room. Ok, I might take some slack for this but I found I was spending too much time there downloading stuff that I never utilized. In fact, I still have a special "War Room" folder filled with goodies I haven't even looked at.
6) Clickbank! I know CB is really popular but I eventually moved my affiliate program to a better platform for various reasons including; poor quality of affiliates, inability to offer 100% commissions, high fees, higher refunds, and the list goes on. Bottom line: things got better when I left Clickbank.
7) Just throwing my ebook and website "out there" and expecting instant sales. Yes, you might get a few but you have to actively PROMOTE your business if you expect it to become a business. This doesn't have to be too difficult; in fact, it simply comes down to putting your product in front of quality, targeted leads. The trick is figuring out how you're going to do that.
8) Promoting my site on a Squidoo lens. This really didn't do anything. Of course, maybe I wasn't doing it right but I felt there were better things to do with my time.
9) Social Bookmarking. (See above.) Forum posting and blog commenting. (See above.)
10) Procrastinating or chasing after every new shiny object and buying "proven systems" that will make me a millionare overnight. Yes, I used to do too much chasing. Eventually, I realized I needed to stay focused on my plan and not get distracted.
Ok, that's it. Hope I help out a few warriors.
Plans for 2012:
1) Stop being a frickin control freak and start outsourcing more!
2) Create a high end Video Course product and promote it to my existing customers.
3) Recruit more affiliates.
4) Start getting more into Article Marketing. (I'm SOOOO going to dominate the cauliflower soup recipes niche.)
5) Double my sales from last year!!
Let's make it a great 2012 for all of us!
I had my first "X" figure month and also reached "X" figures for the year. I won't discuss exact dollar amounts because that's not my style but it was cool to see this happen and all this from selling two little ebooks in the dating niche.
I remember back in 2008 when I finished my first ebook. A few days after putting it online, I got my first sale. At that point I realized the possibilities and that you CAN make money on the Internet!
Fast forward to now, and it's getting hard to keep up with all the sales that come in some days... I still use Excel as my only record keeping mechanism and may have to switch to something else soon.
The amazing thing about this is it's all mostly profit as I have almost NO overhead and I outsource nothing, other than website graphics. (I'm not much of an artsy guy so thank god for those nerdy graphics guys.) I only have a handful of affiliates who makes sales and I run everything myself.
Yah, and I still have my day job to deal with on top of all this.
Of course joining the Warrior Forum and following the great advice offered by so many valuable members here has helped me considerably.
My business is basically on autopilot right now and to anyone new starting out, I'd like to offer some tips.
The following is what worked and did NOT work for me. That doesn't mean it will work for you but take from it what you must:
What worked:
1) Deciding to enter a niche that I'm already passionate about and have extensive knowledge. I don't think I would have kept at it if I was writing about stuff I don't care about.
2) Starting a blog and consistently putting in quality content. I found that various blog posts were ranking high for good keywords and this happened almost accidentally in most cases.
3) Running PPC campaigns on Google Adwords, at least for a time. It helps to find a training course on this subject as you can really lose money if you don't know what you're doing.
4) Running a CPM campaign on a website where extremely targeted leads are already hanging out. This really helped me build my list more quickly. And it didn't cost a whole lot either.
5) Putting out a really high quality ebook! My refund rate is less than 2% and I rarely get any negative feedback about either of my ebooks. I made sure they were top notch and spent a ton of time creating them.
6) Putting a lot of effort into excellent customer support. I check emails like five times a day and always get back to customers right away. It's appreciated and will help your business in the long run.
7) Following the advice of certain WF members. After being around here for a while, I was able to figure out who knew their stuff and who did not.
8) Moving my websites to Wordpress. Best thing I ever did! It wasn't too difficult to learn WP, but once I switched over, my rankings improved for lots of different keywords.
9) Getting rid of cumbersome Ebook software that produces EXE files and moving to PDF ebooks. Initially, I was way too concerned about people stealing my work and was focusing too much energy on it. Eventually I ditched the old software and went to PDF ebooks and sales did not suffer at all. In fact, they went up and customer support issues went down.
10) Working hard, setting goals and sticking to them! It always helps if you have a plan and take things one step at a time. This is HIGHLY Recommended!
What did NOT work:
1) Any and EVERY method that involves taking shortcuts or trying to cheat the search engines. I didn't do a lot of them but none that I did try really worked.
2) Submitting my website or articles to a gazillion article directories and hoping for instant traffic. Yes, I used some of those auto submitters but they often didn't work very well and my results were non existent.
3) Buying traffic from those websites that promise to blast your email to millions of "targeted" customers. Tried this once and spent $200 and got NO leads or additional sales. They are a total scam and it's a shame they are allowed to operate freely.
4) Trying to copy other gurus or others who claim to be "killing it" with their "method." Yes there are some gurus out there who have good stuff but I found that a lot of their methods didn't work well for me. There came a point where I realized I had to focus on things that will work "just for me."
5) Spending too much time in the War Room. Ok, I might take some slack for this but I found I was spending too much time there downloading stuff that I never utilized. In fact, I still have a special "War Room" folder filled with goodies I haven't even looked at.
6) Clickbank! I know CB is really popular but I eventually moved my affiliate program to a better platform for various reasons including; poor quality of affiliates, inability to offer 100% commissions, high fees, higher refunds, and the list goes on. Bottom line: things got better when I left Clickbank.
7) Just throwing my ebook and website "out there" and expecting instant sales. Yes, you might get a few but you have to actively PROMOTE your business if you expect it to become a business. This doesn't have to be too difficult; in fact, it simply comes down to putting your product in front of quality, targeted leads. The trick is figuring out how you're going to do that.
8) Promoting my site on a Squidoo lens. This really didn't do anything. Of course, maybe I wasn't doing it right but I felt there were better things to do with my time.
9) Social Bookmarking. (See above.) Forum posting and blog commenting. (See above.)
10) Procrastinating or chasing after every new shiny object and buying "proven systems" that will make me a millionare overnight. Yes, I used to do too much chasing. Eventually, I realized I needed to stay focused on my plan and not get distracted.
Ok, that's it. Hope I help out a few warriors.
Plans for 2012:
1) Stop being a frickin control freak and start outsourcing more!
2) Create a high end Video Course product and promote it to my existing customers.
3) Recruit more affiliates.
4) Start getting more into Article Marketing. (I'm SOOOO going to dominate the cauliflower soup recipes niche.)
5) Double my sales from last year!!
Let's make it a great 2012 for all of us!
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