What I’m really trying to encourage is the idea of you building something substantial, something exciting, something you want to live and breathe every day. Something more substantial than spreading yourself thinly across short term active income streams and five, ten, twenty different web properties all offering various degrees of ‘potential’ and promises of passive income.

To build something substantial doesn’t mean you have to build ’something else’ or ’something new’, although that could be exactly what you need to do now or in the longer term. You could quite possibly take something you’re doing now and give it your all – look at the possibilities of building a current site or activity into something more than what you might have planned to.

Jack of all trades, master of none

Perhaps creating something with more authority, depth, size, longevity isn’t for everyone and if you’re just starting out online or feel a lack of knowledge generally, you might be hesitant to think ‘big’. Actually to be perfectly honest, I think the less you know the better off you are.

How so?

If you don’t understand about all the ways to make money online, are not sure what all the Twitter and Facebook fuss is about, you can simply focus on one or two medium to long term projects without so many tempting distractions. Whereas if you know how to quickly build niche blogs, MFAs (made for AdSense sites), review sites, re-purpose PLR, flip websites, find cheap ‘unique’ articles, run a WSO (Warrior Special Offer), perform article marketing, provide writing services, design services and a whole lot more, then you can actually find yourself doing all of those things in some way shape of form.

What happens whilst you’re doing all those things? Well it’s less likely that any one thing will grow into anything substantial.

Going beyond the sale

Is it possible for you to take your active income stream and develop it beyond the initial sale? Develop it into a business? Perhaps you don’t want to and perhaps it’s not your active income stream you’d like to develop but rather one of your favorite niche blogs or review sites. Or it’s something new that you just know you’d enjoy working on and building up.

It can be easier to flitter about from one site to the next to the next, building Squidoo lens after Squidoo lens to point at your sites, to submit article after article to your twenty plus sites but is it worth it? Is it worth it for you to spread your efforts across mini-sites instead of digging into something you and others love and apply all your skills and knowledge to a passion or area of serious interest to you?

Maybe knowing what that thing is you’d love to develop alludes you right now but just starting to consider focusing your energy more will help you get a feel for the difference between sprinkling a little bit of you across many things versus giving a lot of focus to one or two things.

Don’t hold yourself back too long though. Don’t be afraid to develop something out a little bit even if it’s not what you sense would be your ‘ultimate’ online business. You can always sell the business down the track if you find something else you want to pursue that you’re more excited and passionate about.

Considering the customer life cycle

So where do you begin? How do you move from the mindset and busyness of stirring 20 pots of broth on the stove to stepping back and looking for a new recipe full of depth and flavour? Begin by considering the customer life cycle.

In a previous post related to site flipping I mentioned:

There is more to this business though than the simplistic calculation of the difference between the costs associated with your site sales and the final bid price.  There are many ways to earn income from your buyers outside of the Flippa marketplace.

Whether you write articles, flip websites, design graphics, build WordPress themes, offer tech support, blog in obscure niches etc, there is opportunity to retain customers.

I see far less focus on retaining customers online compared to my off-line experience and when the focus is there online it’s more often than not very short sighted. It’s usually in the form of subscribing to a list and then the customer being bombarded with offers that don’t logically flow.

The ‘flow’ of offers I’m used to receiving is quite frankly in the order in which the marketer’s friends launch their products. So today’s offer might be on outsourcing and tomorrow’s on awesome video production. Next week might be about making AdSense sites and the week after niche sites. It doesn’t flow and therefore doesn’t make a great deal of sense to me not to mention help me get anywhere in particular. I haven’t been retained as a customer by many Internet marketers.

Focus and consider your customers’ real needs

When you start focusing your efforts in one or two specific areas you will attract and connect with customers who are very targeted to what you have to share. As you pour out your energy and your enthusiasm into what you’re doing, that will be felt and absorbed by those who share your passion. You will quite naturally retain more customers as you deliver what you intuitively know they need.

Of course there is more to it than simply having a passion for something and sharing it but personally, I couldn’t think of a better and more enjoyable place to begin.

Are you up for the challenge of building something substantial?

Do you haves skills, passion and knowledge that you could should be sharing with the world?

Are you ready to start enjoying yourself?

Something I’ve found that’s helped me has been music. I’ve found it helps me plough through the more mundane tasks and or just brighten my day and mood. When I’m more upbeat I tend to be able to ‘get started’ on things that I’ve been putting off such as big projects or even just tidying up my desk or inbox. I have to admit though that I’ve tended to grab music from YouTube a lot and have more than once spent way too much time watching videos when I was supposed to be working with the music in the background!

Working online for myself means there isn’t anyone keeping me in check; no colleagues expecting me to pull my weight, no boss asking me to meet deadlines and no clock telling me when I can and can’t knock off for the day. I’m my own boss but quite frankly, without some of those external factors pushing me along, my productivity has been half what it could be and that’s being kind!

A couple of weeks ago though, something happened that has literally changed the way I work. I found me some kick ass motivation at Blogger Beats.

Blogger Beats was launched at the beginning of May by Nathan Hangen and Oleg Mokhov. To say Nathan and Oleg are an awesome combination is an understatement! Nathan’s cut-to-the-chase style inspires, motivates and moves quickly enough to keep your interest but still at a pace and level of detail to understand the points he’s making. Combine that with Oleg’s awesome mix of music that is uplifting enough to get you moving in your seat but not so distracting you can’t concentrate, and the result is powerful!

What exactly does Blogger Beats offer? Well in Nathan’s words:

Blogger Beats is part motivation, part business, part sleeves rolled up and down to business, part sleeves buttoned and down to business.

Let’s not forget about the awesome, original and unique tunes created by the mixmaster himself, Oleg Mokhov.

All designed to help you get in the zone and be more productive than ever before.

All in all, you’ll get 2 brand new shows each and every week. They’re around 30 minutes on average, and they’re all unique.

Every episode I’ve listened to so far has been awesome and I can’t wait to hear next weeks sessions!

I know I’m not the only one who struggles with getting motivated and staying motivated which is why I’m so happy to be sharing this with you and anyone else who hasn’t heard about Blogger Beats before. It’s just the combination I need to help motivate and energise my work time and I hope it can help you too.

You can try it out for seven days for only $1!

Update! You can now try Blogger Beats for FREE for seven days. Get it here!

____________________________________________

In everyone’s life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit.
Albert Schweitzer

Well not much seems to have changed since seven years ago. The search results I saw today on the first page of Google when I typed in make money from home were in the main about earning through surveys. Surveys? Is that it? The top ten results in the world and they’re all pretty much about taking surveys!? (Even though I searched global, the results I see in Australia will be different to what you see in your country although there were still plenty of .com sites interspersed with the .com.au sites.)

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that you can’t make money from home by taking surveys but if you took the page one search results as any indication you might think that was your only option. Well isn’t it good news that taking surveys is not the only option!

What about you? Do you recall the searches you typed in when you first started looking for ways to make extra money, start a little business or simply find a J.O.B. you could do from home like I wanted to? Maybe you typed in home business or work at home mum jobs.

Cast your mind back and think about what it was you wanted to achieve when you first started looking. I wrote a post quite a few months ago about how easy it is to lose sight of that initial desire to earn an extra $100 or so a month, especially once you stumble on the make money online market.

Have you achieved even your most humble goal yet, you know the one where you thought to yourself “Wow, if I could just earn an extra $100 a month that would ease the pressure.” or “If the $300 a month car payment was taken care of it would really help.”

Have you achieved those initial goals yet or have you gotten caught up in the dreaming and not really ‘doing’? Or are you tired of dreaming and moved on to sheer skepticism where you don’t believe it’s really possible to earn $100 a month from home?

I think everyone goes through that stage where they believe it’s not real, there is no ‘real money’ coming out of the Internet and many give up and walk away. I tend to be a little more (okay a lot more!) tenacious than that and would rather prove it does or doesn’t work once and for all rather than walk away not really knowing for certain.

Well the good news is that there are so many ways to make money online that it’s mind boggling! Take your pick! I have yet to try a method that doesn’t actually work, that doesn’t bring in some money! That’s right! I’ve yet to try a method that doesn’t bring in some money!

Do you get the concept of scaling up? In terms of making money online generally it’s about bedding down a system and then duplicating what you’ve already done, over and over. When I set out to prove whether or not you can make money from AdSense and I actually made a few dollars quickly and easily, it was obvious that multiple sites would equal more AdSense income.

So I proved to myself that yes, people do actually click on the ads, yes Google do actually deposit money into my account and they don’t ask for it back! And I’ve proven that you can get clicks as high as $1, $2, $3 plus. Nothing new is it but me being me, I had to prove it to myself. You might be thinking like I did that, well that’s AdSense, it’s Google, ok it’s going to work but don’t peeve Google or you’re out of luck if they ban your account. That’s true and I’ve previously written about not having all your eggs in one basket but what amazes me is how quickly we forget that a J.O.B. can be ripped from underneath us at any moment too.

So what about trying to make money from this thing called blogging and making affiliate commissions, that’s just little old us talking about stuff on our blogs with some ads and affiliate links thrown in, does it work? Yes. I don’t have a ton of traffic like YouTube does but again, if I make some affiliate commission here and there it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that if I increase my traffic that I will likely make more affiliate commission.

That’s two options, what about the much crowed about ‘product creation’ idea? You know the one where you write an ebook, pop it into ClickBank where affiliates could choose to promote your product for you and you sit back and bank cheques, surely it isn’t that easy right? Yes it really can be that easy, I’ve done it.

I wanted to try more methods, learn the theories, put them into action; prove them, disprove them, whatever the outcome I wanted to know if I could get even a few dollars from a method because from there I knew I or anyone else could scale that if they chose to and see some success. (Are you getting the idea that I was one of those kids in the lolly shop choosing one of everything? )

I wondered about selling the stuff? What stuff? You know all this virtual real estate that we can develop in a zillion different ways, can it really be sold? If you’ve been around these parts a while now I think you would know that I’ve well and truly discovered that yes you can sell it!

What about writing? There are professional web writers who have so much work on their hands that they can afford to outsource it to their own team of writers! I’m not talking about people who write for $2 an article no. I’m referring to professional web writers, I’m talking about writers who command a minimum $10 per article and often charge $15 to $25 an article. Can that really be done, really? Yes, I personally know a professional web writer who commands $25 an article!

Need I go on?

What I’m trying to say is that if you want to make money from home there are plenty of ways other than taking surveys! Sounds easy in theory I know, and to be perfectly honest it’s not all a walk in the park. It’s not necessarily only about taking an ebook, working through it and hey presto it’s all gonna’ work out fine! Even the most basic technical things can seem insurmountable when you begin something new, I know I avoided selling web property for a long time due to the ‘dreaded site transfer.’

Working through difficulties on your own isn’t really a lot of fun either and can often contribute to the ‘give up’ factor. Personally, I’ve found learning new things to be much more enjoyable when I’ve bought a solid product that offers some level of support.

I have paid out literally thousands of dollars on training materials and to be coached by some of the best online marketers around, I’ve spent hours working through tutorials on difficult programs, on technical problem solving, on finding out for myself whether something works and how. I’ve been burned by some over hyped offers too! And it’s after all that time, testing and investment that I know you can make money from home online and not just one way. So if you’ve been rather skeptical then try to get past that. Stop wasting time wondering and start doing instead. Prove it to yourself; it can be done.

What I’ve discussed in this post is doable by people just like you, you can make money with AdSense, you can make money with ebooks, you can make money selling web property, you can develop virtual real estate so many ways and make money.

The problem that comes after finally believing it’s possible to make money online is one of choice.

The choices are so many that you can often find yourself not actually ‘doing’ any of them or if you do there are more questions left unanswered than answered, which can lead to frustration and you giving up on that particular method.

I know that many of you who have considered selling web property haven’t even tried it for fear of the site transfer among other things. Many of my survey respondents I’ve had the good fortune to hear from, expressed that they are fearful of the site transfer and concerned with not having anyone to help them should they get into a technical pickle. Advice on how to make sites look good, what types of sites to build and sell and some general hand holding, feedback and advice on developing virtual real estate were some of the other things mentioned in the survey responses.

I want to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has downloaded and read my free QuikCash ebook and taken the time to answer the survery questions, you’ve helped me gain a good understanding of the areas you would like specific help with. I’ll have some news to share in the coming week about how I can help you more so watch this space!

Although I like to consider plans for the future more than I enjoy looking back on the past, I think it’s important to reflect and be open to really ’seeing’ what I created in my life, how that served me and how to learn from that for the coming year.

When I think about 2009 and the few years prior to that I can encapsulate them in one word -  ‘progressive’. Offline and online I feel I’ve made a tremendous amount of progress and that progress wasn’t restricted to only the aspects of my life that I set specific goals in, it also came in areas I didn’t expect it.

In terms of my online businesses there are many tangible accomplishments I’ve seen in 2009 and those things were achieved as a result of not just what I did this past year but rather a cumulative affect of all I’ve learned and done over many years. Looking back I can see that I quite literally have experienced a snowball effect beginning with my early ebook writing days in 2006 and my very first self-taught website build in 2007.

It wasn’t long after that that I took one of the major success factors I’d used offline and applied it to my online goals – I employed a mentor. After almost 18 months of solid Internet marketing coaching, advice, virtual kicks-up-the-butt and what have you from my mentor Josh Spaulding, I stand even more strong by what I’ve written previously – a quality mentor, coach, guide or what ever name you like to call it, plays a SIGNIFICANT part in how much success you will see and how fast you will see it. The other significant component is YOU.

In 2009 I also joined a program offered by Yaro Starak. This was a large investment in terms of dollars and I would pay it over again and then some for what I’m learning from Yaro. When I look at all the things I’ve learned, experienced and achieved over the last five years I can categorically say that my mentors have helped propel me forward in so many ways, so much more quickly than when I was going it alone.

I’ve joined other programs along the way and learned a lot, bought software to speed up my tasks both off and online and continued to invest in my business education via books, ecourses, ebooks, community forums, blogs and more. At the same time I’ve enjoyed the practical side of proving or disproving a lot of the theory I’ve digested.

I’m very grateful that I’ve had the good fortune of being able to invest so heavily in my online education to date, both with my time and money and I’m acutely aware that not everyone currently has the capacity to do the same. That brings me to the year ahead. For me 2010 is a year in which I hope to be able to transfer my knowledge, experience and learning to you and others so you can live a better life, achieving the things you set out to and to have the things in your life that you desire.

I hope you had a wonderful 2009 and I thank you for your patronage to my blog throughout the year. I wish you a very happy New Year and look forward to working with you in 2010!

2009 – the year that was progressive.

I believe, as did many who commented, that if you enjoy what you do then you’re more likely to stick at it, see results and keep working at it. Sounds great doesn’t it. But it’s not always easy to know whether a particular money making method is right for you when you don’t really know everything that’s involved or at least the large chunks of work involved in certain methods. What about selling web property? I know a lot of you are interested in it but what does it involve?

Here is a mini profile of the major aspects I’ve experienced selling websites:

• Significant amount of technical work
• Significant amount of customer service
• Significant amount of volatility
• Significant amount of profit

How does that sound to you? I’m sure the significant amount of profit sounds good to most but how about the technical and customer service components? Sounds awful to a lot of you I know. If there is one thing that stops many people selling sites it’s the fear of the technical aspects. I’m not going to sugar coat it, there are a lot of technical aspects to this business and they often flow over into the customer service area. The customer service isn’t just about communicating the log in details of the site and pushing a domain name. No! You might find you attract newbies who have no clue how to even manage their hosting. (I had a three day long technical nightmare recently with a newbie, thankfully he was a gorgeous customer who I helped no end out of sheer compassion for him.)

So what do you do? Walk away from a high profit opportunity? What if you love working with people, love building and designing websites but despise the technical aspects as much as I despise writing on topics I have no interest in?

Well my last post sure pointed to the idea that we could just keep looking for our perfect match, that method that ticks every box for us. The one where we love every aspect and just jump out of bed every day busting to get to work. Well although it’s possible to find I would suggest that you don’t wait around for it or justify purchasing another ten shiny objects to see if they suit you. No! What I suggest is for you to find something that you love to do in the main and outsource the ugly bits! The bits you can do but don’t want to. The bits you don’t know how to do but that just have to be done.

Even if you can tolerate ‘most’ functions of a particular method you will drown under the amount of work you need to do to get anywhere. I don’t mean to get anywhere in terms of a hundred bucks here and a hundred bucks there. I mean to get anywhere REALLY! Like a full time plus income! Even if you like it you CANNOT.DO.IT.ALL!

Just because I despise writing do you think that means I’m leaving a heap of AdSense money on the table due to refusing to write the content for my AdSense sites? No way! Do you think that because I cannot write one word on why cats pee on the carpet that I’m not going to create a niche blog around it with loads of content and an awesome eBook on how to solve that problem for people? Of course I’m not! I’m outsourcing it.

Do you want to sell websites but have not once done it because of the technical side? Well you can outsource that component if you don’t like it. You’re hearing about it more and more aren’t you? Outsource, outsource, outsource. It’s becoming almost as common as “The money is in the list”. Why? Because it’s true. The only way forward to stop you drowning in your Internet business is to outsource.

Ok so go do it.

“Huh?”

“But what do I do? What do I outsource? What if they don’t do the ten hours work they said they would? Give them my log ins, are you kidding me?! Ugh, you’ve gone mad Michelle, you make it sound simple but it’s a minefield and you know it!”

Okay you’re right! It isn’t as easy as just saying ‘go outsource your stuff and scale scale scale’. I have only just gotten my outsourcing act together myself BUT being true to form, I had to research it, research it some more and then research it even more.

There are people who have already woken up and realised they can’t do it all and in fact they don’t want to do it all and have been outsourcing for years! That’s right! Whilst you and I have been slogging it out until 2am. (Okay I admit it, 3am!) these dudes have been getting their beauty sleep! Not to mention having fantastic days doing the bits of their business they’re awesome at and love to do whilst someone else churns through all the other crucial bits.

If there is one thing I wished I’d done sooner it’s outsource. Don’t waste any more time chasing your tail. Pick a method that you know you have some affinity for, choose the bits you need to outsource and then you will really start to get some runs on the board.

Of course during all my research I found someone who I am more than happy to recommend to you for advice on outsourcing. You might have already heard of Tyrone Shum and his free eBook. Tyrone has interviewed three people who you cannot go past in terms of advice for working on your business not in it. When I first downloaded the book and realised it was long with three interviews I groaned a bit. I felt like I would have to read a lot of hype and probably not get anything tangible from it. Well I was mistaken! The entire book is full of practical tips and Jeff Mills, one of the entrepreneurs Tyrone interviews, shared a lot of detail and I hung off every word I read. Here is just one snippet that rang  true for me from Tyrone’s “Secrets Of Outsourcing Experts Revealed”:

On the flipside, what have you not been able to do with outsourcing?

You can’t outsource your portion. Seriously! There’s certain things that you’re good at that you should stay being good at. That gives you joy and makes you happy. If you start outsourcing that, it would change your psyche, it would change your make-up, it would change the way you behave in society and people probably won’t like you much anymore. Keep doing the things you love to do and the things that you’re good at and then outsource the rest. Outsource the stuff you don’t have time to do, outsource the stuff you don’t want to do or don’t know how to do but keep doing what you’re good at.

Jeff Mills – From “Secrets Of Outsourcing Experts Revealed” by Tyrone Shum

If there is one thing you do before you start outsourcing it’s read Tyrone’s free eBook and then watch the free video training series that Tyrone has created himself. If you want to hear from someone who is extremely successful, honestly wants to help you get out of your own way and gives away content that you would no doubt be willing to pay for normally then head over to Mass Outsource.

Oh and you’ll probably notice that Tyrone refers to himself as “The cool Australian entrepreneur”, well he’s not the only one! There are a lot of us entrepreneurs who are Aussie and I reckon’ we’re all pretty cool, Yaro @ Entrepreneurs Journey, Gideon @ Gideon Shalwick, Audrey @ Home Schooling Income, oh and me , to name but a few tee he.

But seriously, just because Tyrone is Aussie and cool to boot doesn’t make me biased toward recommending him. For those that know me well you should know that I don’t recommend anything that is not what I consider real value from an honest and ethical marketer. For those that don’t know me so well all I can say is that I’ve seen hype gone mad, marketers who are loud, self proclaimed kings and who at their core don’t really give a damn about much other than a sale and I never recommend them.

Anyway, you be the judge, check out what Tyrone is giving away and use it! Get ready to outsource and take your business to the next level. Don’t push projects aside or leave new products on your hard drive just because there are chunks of work that just don’t suit you. Make a decision on one model you’re going to focus on immediately and get to it with people in the background churning through the bits you don’t want to! AND it doesn’t cost anywhere near what you think, this is truly affordable!

You can grab your free copy of “Secrets Of Outsourcing Experts Revealed” here.

And view the free Mass Outsource training videos here.

Let me know what you think? I’d love to hear if you got as much out of Tyrone’s material as I did. Tyrone is opening up his outsourcing membership on Tuesday November 17th so if you’re ultra serious keep track of the countdown timer here!

You do the same the next day and the next and the next, and that’s if you believe you’ll see results early. If results are more likely to come in eight months time, well you probably have saved the idea on your hard drive for ‘another day’ when world peace reigns over us and everything is sunshine and rainbows. That day never comes, oh and the thing you worked on every day turned into every other day and then faded into nothing.

Oh come on admit it, you have a crap load of ’stuff’ on your hard drive that you have NEVER seen through to the end to even know if it works, right?! But do you know why? Like really? Do you have a handful of excuses or do you really truly understand why you are constantly dazzled by the next “How I Made $20,000 In 2 Weeks And You Can Too!!!!!!” sales letter?

Do you remember saying something like “Heck, I would clean toilets for some cash, so long as I could do it from home! Anything, give me anything that works and I’ll just do it! Get me out of this hole I’m in!” So what happened? Did all this stuff you bought and semi studied, semi implemented not work? Really it just plain doesn’t work? Well how do you know when you’ve never really, truly followed through on any of it?

I’m here to tell you that not only do you not have to clean toilets to earn money from home, but that you can simply sit at your desk whenever you please, play on your computer, push the mouse around a bit, read some stuff and write a whole lot of other stuff and that’s it! That’s it!  You can make money online as a freelance writer, niche blogger, virtual assistant, affiliate marketer, eBook publisher, site flipper, article marketer and the list goes on and on and on.

Sounds like a great solution doesn’t it? It sure gives you and me the means to reach the core goal of earning money from home and all without a toilet brush in sight…Oh except my own but now I’m getting a cleaner in to do that it’s off my radar altogether. (Don’t worry, I’m not precious, I did tell you I once worked for McDonald’s and had to clean their portable toilets didn’t I? Actually I am a bit precious but that’s just between us. )

So why? Why is it that so many excitedly grab all their new goodies and then end up a few months down the track no closer to the ultimate goal, which was earn money from home? And at this point buy into a new method and start something new with a ton of enthusiasm! Are you getting dizzy just thinking about this merry-go-round? I know I am!

So what’s driving all this madness? Some will say it’s time. “I have no time, I work during the day, have kids and a house to manage, my online time is so limited.” But time has nothing to do with not starting and completing something, it just means it will take longer than someone working it full time.

Others will say, “Oh I did try it, it just didn’t work.” Now this one sounds good but really, how many people, including yourself can hold hand on heart and say “I did it to the letter, consistently and it didn’t work! I gave it a go, I tried several markets, I didn’t give up just because one niche I chose didn’t work, I had another three gos and ‘the method’ does not work!” Short of scams, I would be shocked to hear of anyone who could say that hand on heart and it be true!

So many people will tell themselves that they ‘did it’, and ‘it didn’t work’. Um, sorry but you probably didn’t really ‘do it’ and if you did and it didn’t work first time you should try it again, especially if others have had success with it. It could have been the niche, a competitor might have come out of the wood work whilst you were beavering away and they took over your market, Google might have made a change that you didn’t see coming etc. But more often than not there is never even arrival at ‘the end’ to be able to honestly say that the work was completely done so you are able to determine whether your chosen method ‘did or didn’t work’. Most people  just don’t follow through even though they want a certain outcome a lot and certain methods promise to deliver that outcome, but they don’t do what it will take! Why? Why would someone work against themselves like that? Does this sound familiar to you?

Well I have a theory on why you and many others never actually follow through on the products that you get given or buy. Are you ready for this, it’s really quite technical so prepare your mind ok? The reason is…….

…..some methods simply don’t suit you!

To actually ‘do’ some of these things I’ve bought that promise to bring me millions of dollars  would quite frankly make me feel as though I was a square peg being belted by a sledge hammer into a round hole! They just don’t suit me!

It’s not rocket science! People aren’t following through because they decide the method doesn’t work, it’s not because they’re too busy! No! It’s because maybe, just maybe they really despise article writing on subjects they have no affinity for. So if they buy a product and ‘discover’ it involves a lot of article writing, well what are the chances of them following through on it? They most likely won’t, UNLESS, unless their back is against the wall and or the alternative is much much worse! Only then will something get done because there is a sense of there being no other choice.

You see that photo above? That my friend is what article writing feels like to me! That is what a caged bird feels like; broken, squeezed and downright uncomfortable! Is there money in the ‘quit smoking’ market? Hell yes! Can I write 20 articles on it? Oh please, I’d almost rather eat nails! I can start out thinking, dreaming, driving through the pain just to get to the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow but we all know the pot of gold is staying there. Why would I go down a path that feels like I’m being hit by a sledge hammer, surely it’s instinctive to avoid pain?!

Of course not everyone is in a position to be ‘picky’ about what they do for cash and I feel pain when I see people pushing it up hill to avoid poverty or just to get food in their stomachs or to keep the meter running so they can cook. I’m not talking about the severely disadvantage at the moment though, I’m talking about people who ride the merry-go-round of work at home jobs/make money online product purchases and never really getting anywhere.

Two things at play here is the fact that thankfully in a lot of cases peoples’ circumstances are not nearly as disadvantaged as some and also they are not uncomfortable enough with their current situation. If those two things were reversed then you and I both would not hesitate to go to the pawn shop with our gold jewelery to buy food if we had to! But alas we are lucky. Hopefully you’re fortunate enough that things are not that bad yet the fact that the status quo is bearable, well it can work against you reaching your goals.

So what are we to do? How can we push ourselves through these days, hours, minutes of ‘Oh I just need to watch the news and then I might ring Jo and chat for a bit about the ball game and then I’ll get to work on my sites. I’m going to write 10 articles tonight!’ But amazingly enough, the news leads to The Simpsons which leads to CSI which leads to a packet of chips on the couch and then that phone call to Jo. Which leads to, oh crap it’s bed time.’ Ok you get the picture. It could very well be, “I’ll just check email, I’ll just check Twitter, I’ll just check FaceBook, I’ll just check forum 1, forum 2 and forum 3 and then I’ll just check email again and then I’ll write some articles. Oh look, Mary sent some pictures of her new puppy on FaceBook, I’ll just check FaceBook and then I’ll……………………….”

Am I scolding you? No! What I’m trying to say (1500 words later ) is if you choose things that make you feel like a square peg being hammered into a round a hole, well what the heck hope have you got of following through on any of it?

I know a lot of people are interested in selling websites. There are hundreds of people who’ve downloaded my free QuikCash eBook. How many have actually got it open, read it and started following it to a T, without distraction, go go go? Well I’m happy to say that there are quite a few that I know of! I’ve had some great emails from people who are very enthusiastic telling me about how they sold their first site etc and to them I say, job well done and thank you for sending me your emails! So are there more who are ‘doing it’? Yes I’m sure there are. But are the majority ‘not doing it’? I would say categorically yes! Most people are not and will not follow through on it. Granted some will download everything they can and even buy a lot of products too so they can learn a variety of things that can be integrated into other business models, I fall into that category. But I’m sure there were a lot of people who seriously thought they would set up some sites to sell and make some quick money but haven’t. Why? Well they probably don’t realise it but it’s because it just doesn’t suit them!

Am I stating the obvious? It feels like it but then why are so many people buying product after product after product and not getting very far? Why is it that very successful Internet marketers cannot get boat loads of good testimonials for their awesome products they sell? Because not many people are following through! Why? Because the job at hand, the very thing that will see them succeed and reach their goals, it just doesn’t suit them. They don’t like how it feels to ‘do it’ so they wander off either to get the next big thing and or to get a refund 59 days later.

So where to now? Well you know I love developing virtual real estate, I love graphic design and I love selling web property but do you? Just because I write and rave on about selling web property doesn’t mean it will work out for you necessarily. Not because selling sites ‘doesn’t work’. Of course it works, millions of dollars worth of sites have been sold on Flippa, I’ve done it enough to tell you it categorically works. So no, if it doesn’t work out for you it’s not because selling sites doesn’t work it’s because you don’t work for it! You don’t like dealing with customer service issues, or you don’t like anything overly technical because it bores you to tears or you simply cannot take the feelings of rejection if the sites don’t sell. So you and site selling aren’t a match made in heaven, no problem, at least you know and you can go and choose something that is. Well if only it were that easy!

There are many who believe that having a passion, strong interest in or at least some type of affinity with what you choose to do in life will make or break your success and others who believe it doesn’t make one iota of difference. From my experience I am totally convinced that without enough passion, interest or affinity with what you do every day, it just ‘aint gettin’ done. And if it is getting done then it’s getting done at half the rate you would if it were something you loved or had at least some level of affinity with. Of course money can be the only motivator required but it really isn’t enough for a lot of people because if it were there just wouldn’t be so much dust gathering on everyone’s virtual bookshelves.

The good news is this, that if you love certain aspects of a particular money making method and really dislike others then you can simply outsource the bits you don’t like. However if the bits you don’t like are critical and or way too expensive to outsource then  you might need to choose a different option that suits you more.

So is selling web property for you? Or is blogging a better match, or affiliate marketing or freelance writing. Which ones will be a good match for YOU? To understand the answer to that question you need to understand what the key areas of work are and the factors that leverage your level of success with different methods. From there you can get a feel for certain things that fit your skills, likes and dislikes and match you nicely to the tasks at hand so you’re not feeling squeezed into an uncomfortable lot of work.

To ensure you enjoy your journey to achieving your goals I feel it’s important that you understand a lot about the jobs and methods you buy into. Of course we all want the job where we do two hours work for $500 but what if I told you that in those two hours you had to swim with sharks? Well all of a sudden you probably don’t want the job anymore (except the dare devils of course!). So from here I want to explore virtual real estate development and what it entails to sell it so I can help you make a decision about whether it’s really for you or not. My next post will cover what I see the key areas of work and leverage points are for developing web property and selling it and hopefully you’ll gain a good understanding of what you’re getting into and whether YOU match up with it.

Until next time I’d love to get your feedback on this post as it’s quite obviously very long but hopefully enlightening all the same.

I don’t know about you but when I get treated like that as a customer I sure as heck will eventually find out I’ve been jibbed and will tell people about it. It goes without saying that I would never trust you again. The opposite is true if you over deliver on your service, what you sell me does more than I expected and you pretty much showed me that you operate with a good deal of decency. I’ll tell plenty of people about you, show my friends what I bought and become a devoted customer who trusts you.

Operating your business with a level of decency centered around how you would want to be treated yourself will certainly help you set yourself apart from the average person who is willing to sell at all costs. Short term gain is a recipe for long term pain or in this scenario, a not so successful business.

Treat your customers as you yourself would want to be treated and you’ll go a long way toward building a tribe of loyal followers.

So I’m moving the furniture around a little and painting the walls. The renovations will be painless and quick, I hope! Hopefully things will be easier to navigate too once I’m done. Thanks for hanging with me and I look forward to your thoughts on the new theme.

Carpe Diem!
Michelle

When you first started out looking for ways to make money from home do you remember how much you wanted to earn and why?

I do. I wanted to earn enough income from home so I didn’t have to return to work and leave my baby. Today my goal is on replacing my husband’s income so he doesn’t have to work outside of our home either, but why?

Well the why is what inspired this post actually. Almost every day my little boy cries as he watches his dad drive off to work. His tiny hand waves, and he murmurs a “Bye bye Daddy.”

Children are often the reason that people seek to work from home but it’s certainly not the only one. There are the typical things such as hating either the boss, the job, the traveling, the poor pay or all of the above. These are all good reasons to want to work from home, there really is nothing like working in your pajamas and being able to hug your children when ever you want to. And then there is the other reason; the desperate need for money to make the mortgage or rent repayment, credit card bills, to buy food, gas, electricity, to basically survive and once that’s achieved add on some little extras like a movie night or even a holiday if things go well.

It’s very easy to lose sight of what you’re really trying to achieve once you become submerged in the sea of ‘make money online’ marketing, which often sells the ‘Internet Marketer’s Lifestyle’. Fast cars, private jets, world wide travel and money raining miraculously from the sky all on autopilot or at worse working half an hour a day from your yacht or penthouse via your laptop.

This post is a reminder for you to not lose sight of your goals, the things you wanted to achieve when you first set out.  There is nothing wrong with wanting penthouses, half hour work days and the multimillion dollar bank balances, heck I certainly aspire to that BUT if you spend all your time and energy looking for the Holy Grail of passive income that brings in millions in months you could find yourself five years from now with no more money, freedom or goals achieved than you have at this moment. There are ways to build huge amounts of money and passive income streams online, but they don’t happen overnight or without loads of action taking.

So if you’re still back in the starting blocks, not really getting any closer to even your most basic goals then it’s time to focus. There are ways to make money from home today, but only if you’ll settle for the fact you have to do some work! If you need $100 to fill the car with gas or to pay for your children’s swimming lessons, then you can earn it from home in your pajamas, there are plenty of ways! Don’t be afraid to reach some of your initial goals by doing something like writing articles for people. There are very successful Internet marketers who generated their first work-at-home income by writing articles or offering some other type of service. Some of those marketers work very hard to this day and although they might now be making six figures don’t be fooled into thinking that it’s mostly passive income. More enjoyable than a typical job? For sure. More profitable than the average salary? Absolutely. Flexible and mobile? Yes. Hardly any work? No! Of course there are examples where the very wealthy can decide not to work, but generally there is work involved in running businesses that bring in huge dollars.

Try to break down your goals into achievable chunks, remember the why and stay focused otherwise the lure of shiny cars, mansions and millions will send you off track toward the illusive pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. You can achieve big things and it’s from little things that big things grow.

Have you lost sight of your goals or are you on track?

Michelle Adams

Making Money From Home Today

Well where have I been you might ask? I’ve been busy! What have I been busy doing? Well I work from home online and have started carving a nice amount of income from site flipping. Site flipping is one of several methods of online income I use and I hope you are working on several methods too!

This post has been sparked by two things, one from reflecting on my online money making journey over the past three years and the other from when I recently worked on bedding down some serious plans for my next online projects. One thing I recalled is this; I first got really excited about online money making when I had an idea about scaling up one method in a huge way that could make me a lot of money! Luckily I realised early on that putting all my eggs in one basket was a mighty risky investment no matter how golden those eggs appeared to be.

You’ve heard of high paying AdSense clicks right? Well that’s what my entire plan was, to build high paying AdSense sites numbering in the hundreds! Is it doable? Absolutely! Is it profitable? Yes! Is it risky? You bet it is! And here’s why.

What if one day I woke up and received a note from Google telling me my AdSense account had been banned? My entire business would have crumbled to pieces. Forget about why and about defending my right to an account. If you’ve never heard of ‘AdSense bombing’ then Google it, you’ll quickly realise how you could get banned through no fault of your own. Further investigation will lead you to many innocent people with banned accounts and no matter how hard they fought to prove their innocence, many never get their accounts reinstated. I do have eggs in the AdSense basket but certainly not all of them!

Another example is putting all your eggs in the organic search basket. Let’s say you believe that all you need to do is rank high in the SERPs (search engine results pages) and you’ll have targeted traffic galore. So you work your tail off, analyse the competition no end, and slowly but surely claw your way to the front page of Google search for your targeted key phrases. Your traffic stats stabilize as does the income that traffic brings you and you see yourself quitting your day job any month now.

You wake up one morning and discover your site has fallen off the radar. Google have lost the plot! Your business has been relegated to page 100 and your competitors are still rooted to their positions! You see the dollars in your bank account turning backwards and wish to withdraw your resignation you shoved in your bosses face just the day before. Does this happen? Yes! Can you recover from it? Of course. How long would it take to recover? Who knows.

There are plenty of other online business models that can be pulled out from under your feet from factors that are out of your circle of influence whether that be economic trends, market trends or a simple thing as a slight tweak to the Google algorthym. If you work from home online or want to, then you need to be sure you spread your risk. I know some of you will be rolling your eyes thinking that you can’t get even one method to make you any money let alone several but you will and when you do, don’t sit back and rely only on that one method. Once you’ve mastered one be sure to start working on another. Some methods are more risky than others but if you’re aware of them then you can make plans to counteract that risk with more stable business models such as your very own list of subscribers.

Have you got all your eggs in one basket?