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Quitting The Rat Race

by jeskola
16 replies
Hey Warriors,

So i'm at a point now where i'm constantly making money from my website and i have some money saved up. I'm seriously considering jumping ship to go full time very soon -


I suppose i have this nagging feeling that one day i might wake up and it's all stopped. What then - yikes!

On the flip side - the freedom it would give me to live the life i want to live instead of working 10 hour days and life just passing me by is too much to bear.

Financially - since January i've been making roughly double what i earn at work daily and it's only getting better!!

I guess I'm looking for some reassurance! For those that did it what were your experiences of doing it - good and bad?
#quitting #race #rat
  • Profile picture of the author ShaneGorry
    Originally Posted by jeskola View Post

    I suppose i have this nagging feeling that one day i might wake up and it's all stopped. What then - yikes!
    Google - igor ledochowski money in your mind.
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  • Profile picture of the author Chris Thompson
    jeskola,

    I understand that you feel that nagging feeling. One day it could disappear. Yeah, it's possible, but if you have a real business where you are helping people instead of just relying on some kind of "trick of the day", then you know it's sustainable.

    And more important, you've PROVEN you can make it on your own in terms of building a business on the side. Imagine if you were truly focused? You'd be unstoppable.

    Now think about what life will feel like in 5 years if you don't quit your job. Think of all the things you'll have missed out on!

    And now think about that worst case scenario. If you had to get another job for whatever reason, could you? Of course you could.

    Jump. Embrace life. You already HAVE your parachute.
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  • Profile picture of the author HelpingYouBeAnExpert
    I guess one good thing with me is they fired me so I didn't have to figure out when to quit
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  • Profile picture of the author jeskola
    @ShaneGorry

    Nice checking it out now

    @Chris Thompson

    Inspiring. Very good – thanks.
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    Don't look to MAKE money - look to HELP people and you will make all the money you can ever want.

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  • Profile picture of the author Chris The Traffic Blogger
    Be careful where you put your money. You seem to know where you're going, so it's probably wasted advice, but seriously, put your investment money into things you know will pay off.

    I'm not saying you should avoid paying money to invest in your business, quite the contrary, I'm advising you to spend spend spend on what you know makes your business work. This could be sales pages, website design, outsourcing ghost writers, etc.

    The biggest difference for me and my own private practice was when I stopped trying "flavor of the month" products and started just investing in what I already knew worked well. Basically, I invested in myself
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  • Profile picture of the author hustlinsmoke
    I will not give you reassurance, why because I have seen my money stop in an instant on the internet. What you need to make sure of is to have many avenues of making money.

    DO NOT PUT ALL YOUR EGGS IN ONE BASKET.

    Took me three times to learn that. Once with gambling sites, once with prescription drug sites and with internet marketing in 2008. I now know either have a broad niche or many many niches. When I make what I make now with one of my niches and the others are making roughly half, I will quit the rat race and start working full time.
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  • Profile picture of the author Pongo
    Stay white hat ~ I was gray hat and an updated google algo decided not to agree with my linking structure ~poof~ almost 5000 pages got buried deep in the Google serps and all I had was yahoo and msn now (bing) sending me traffic. Years later I'm getting back into it (white hat only).
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  • Profile picture of the author nicolelwriting
    It sounds like you're on a great path however I agree with the others to not put all of your eggs in one basket. Have an egg in one place and another egg elsewhere just in case anything changes. Also make sure you're saving money too as that will help with your rainy day funds, and more.
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  • Profile picture of the author jeskola
    Thanks for all the advice guys.

    Here is a bit more info.

    My website has been generating income for around 2 years – though the first year and a bit was only making between 5 and 20 a day. I did have adsense and got that up to 2 or 300 a month but i felt i was just directing my potential customers to my competitors and away from my products (a 3 cents click vs a $17 product!)

    Around October I added some video products and started ramping up content on the site by outsourcing a content writer.

    By end of last year I was having 3 to 400 days. I released a new product in January and also completely rebuilt / redesigned the site from the ground up which resulted in almost doubling my traffic and pushed me through the 500 a day mark – including a couple of 1000’s and 2000 days. My take home salary is around 190$ a day from my job – so as you can see this has been quite exciting for me.

    I have a strategy for the coming year and have invested money into creating more video products and monthly smaller products.

    My list is at around 12,000 now with 8,000 FB fans (open rates around 30% open/45% click) . Traffic is coming mainly from Google and FB but also from around 10 forums (the busiest in my niche).

    Serps wise I’m on page 1 for a lot of terms – and in fact sit right after the product I promote for the main keyword (they are number 1 – I am number 2)

    I’ve almost finished a clone of my site and will be launching that in a week or so – if Site A is about green umbrellas then this new site will be about red umbrellas – so i’m hoping I can cross over a lot of the users/ traffic.

    I’ve been spending my money on a proper copywriter – I’m lucky however I have been a web designer/developer and digital strategist for around 10 years now – so I have a lot knowledge and experience from my job – which has saved me loads of time and money I guess. I’ve also got 4 people now outsourced to create content for my original site and my new site. My next hiring will be someone to handle customer queries as this is what takes up most of my time in relation to the site as it is.

    The next big investment will be advertising and an affiliate program for my own products. I’ve yet to use adwords so I’m quite excited to see what a difference that can make – affiliate wise... Not sure there are many in my niche – but we will see.

    So all In all I am in good stead (I think).

    Once this new site is of the ground I plan to rinse repeat again and again with similar products so I can cross over my traffic / communities.

    In terms of white/black hat – it’s all white... I’ve never done anything other than good SEO and forum marketing.

    Residual money out with investing I have saved up a lump of about 3 months cash and everything else I used to clear all my debt and have been paying down my mortgage.

    I officially registered my company late last week so will be changing over my PP account to a verified business account – so hopefully no issues there either.

    My worry is that one day my product may not be of use to anyone and so my traffic will dwindle – or something like PP pulls my account ... Something outwith my control and I’m left high and dry.

    As mentioned above I could get another job – but really the whole point in everything I have done , until now... Is to escape that so I can live my life the way I want to rather than a slave to system.

    I guess i do have all my eggs in one basket right now - but i'm working on changing that now.
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    Don't look to MAKE money - look to HELP people and you will make all the money you can ever want.

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  • Profile picture of the author Michael Ten
    Indeed, as they noted above, don't put all your eggs in one basket. Have multiple income streams, so that if one or two drop, you are not in a tough spot. Stay white hat, and focus on security and success perhaps.
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  • Profile picture of the author lucidsuccess
    Always have multiple streams of income, all eggs could break
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  • Profile picture of the author SamuelUherek
    Totally understand your feelings. The thing is, when you THINK, TRY, TEST you will never get lost and loose everything. If you provide value and your customers rely on you most of the time. You should not be worried about it.

    And if you did it once, you probably won't have a problem to do it the second time either. I might cost you a lot of energy, but I bet you could do the same faster and with less mistakes.

    Stop worrying and your earnings will boost as well (at least my case)
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  • Profile picture of the author Dean Thompson
    Although I'm not at the same stage as you YET, you have shown that you've got the right mindset to succeed and become even more successful in a fulltime roll.

    A lot of the people on this forum have the same dream as you & I'm sure they would wholeheartedly recommend you to go for it.

    Well done.


    Ozzelli
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  • Profile picture of the author gvsridhar171
    to take a decision if we get conflicting opinions then you wont be able to decide. if you feel by coming to internet full time, you are going to reap good rewards, then you should go for it. will I be successful ? will i not be successful ? these questions will never let you take a decision. By asking opinions from people, if people keep pushing you to go full time on internet, will you do it ? still you wont be able to take a decision. so it's important that you should feel comfortable about what you are going to do. For that a secured income will enable you to take the right decision. Ask yourself a question. Do you have a stable and comfortable income which is secured ?
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  • Profile picture of the author Chris Thompson
    jeskola,

    You have everything in place to feel good about making the leap. Other than the extra money, wasn't this EXACTLY why you started an online business - to be able to cut the ties to a desk job working for someone else?

    Get "The Four Hour Work Week" and do the fear definition exercise he lays out. It will make things crystal clear for you.

    There is ALWAYS a recovery plan from any disaster.

    PayPal shuts you out? Move to Authorize.net or 1ShoppingCart, or whatever.
    Website crashes? Have backups in place.
    Product no longer useful to people? You're not sitting on your ass. You are busy creating more products every year right?

    You get the picture.

    We should chat, BTW - what you did and what I did is pretty similar. Feel free to PM me.
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