Archive for January, 2010
A couple of weeks ago, I had the privilege of speaking with Darren Rowse from Problogger.net, who has been more than a true inspiration to me ever since I started blogging. If you’re insane and you don’t know who he is, he’s like the Michael Jordan of the blogging world – he’s original, he’s got mad skills and he’s bald.
No offense Darren. I would gladly shave my head if it meant I could get to your level one day. Although, maybe that’s the trick. Think of Seth Godin, ShoeMoney and Leo Babauta – all top level bloggers…all bald.
Hmm…
Anyways, what made our recent conversation really special for me was the fact that Darren was interviewing me! I still can’t believe it, but it’s true. The interview was announced on Problogger.net yesterday, so if you haven’t heard it already, you can listen to it by subscribing to Darren’s newsletter.
If you’ve already listened to it, thank you for the gift of your time, and thanks to any new subscribers coming over here from Darren’s blog.
Side note: I apologize for the low volume on my end. I’m in the middle of a move and was using a backup microphone that apparently made my voice very soft. When my podcast comes out later in the year, I promise the quality on my end will be much better!
At the end of the interview, Darren had asked me to leave one parting tip for bloggers, and this is what I said:
In order to get to that next level, you’re going to have to take bold actions…
This is a followup post to that very statement.
The Routine
Ahh yes – the routine. A lot of what we do in life is simply part of a routine, and it’s not a bad thing. In fact, a routine helps us live a healthy, stress-free and happy lifestyle. We’re comfortable in a routine.
However, when trying to progress online with our blogs or our businesses, falling into a comfortable routine can stop us from ever seeing the influential results that we want to see.
Doing the same thing day in and day out – whether it be simply writing a new blog post, updating your Twitter or Facebook status, or commenting on other people’s blogs – will definitely help us progress, but it won’t take us to that next level. It’s the bold actions that we take outside of the routine that help us get there.
Think of it like a mountain that you wish to climb. There’s a set of stairs that wind all the way around the mountain, circling hundreds of times so that you can slowly make your way up to the top. In order to reach your goal faster, you can get off the stairs and create your own path.
Yes, it’s uncomfortable.
Yes, it’s risky.
Yes, it takes more effort.
Yes, it’s not part of the normal routine.
But that’s what makes it a bold action, one that could help us reach our goals much faster than if we simply relied on the routine.
Bold Actions
So what exactly are the bold actions that you should take?
For me, it was filing papers for my LLC. It was joining a mastermind group and asking hundreds of questions until I understood exactly what I had to do. It was spending 2 months to write an eBook. It was deciding to be completely transparent on this blog down to the penny. It was personally emailing Darren Rowse and telling him my story.
It was doing things that I was not completely comfortable with, but knew I had to do get to me to where I wanted to go.
And you?
I can’t tell you what bold actions you should take. However, I believe that most of you already have an idea of what they are. It’s probably something that you’ve been wanting to do for a long long time.
So why not now?
Thanks again for your support – it means the world to me. Have a great weekend, and stay tuned for my January 2010 Monthly Income Report in my next post.
Cheers!
p.s. Congrats to Stephanie from EmptyNestRenesting for winning a free copy of the new 4-Hour Workweek from my last post! Thanks everyone for sharing your seriously awesome comments!
Here’s the scenario:
You have a business idea that you could build up and sell in 3 years for $5 million – guaranteed. However, during those 3 years, you will be required to work an average of 75-80 hours a week.
Would you do it? Why or Why not?
I had asked this question to my fans yesterday on my Facebook Page, and the response was incredible. Within a few hours, over 25 people responded with various reasons why they would or wouldn’t go through with it. All had very valid, but different reasons.
What’s the purpose of this exercise?
The purpose of this thought exercise is to get you to really think about what’s important in your life. Thinking about this may put things into perspective as far as the lifestyle that you live now, the lifestyle you’d live while working 80 hours a week, and the lifestyle you’d have after you sold your business 3 years later. What’s important to you? It may have an effect on what you end up doing now.
Please assume that the $5 million is totally guaranteed (don’t ask me how, it just is. This is a hypothetical thought exercise people!), and you must do all of the work yourself (i.e., you can’t outsource any part of it).
Finally, I still have a few new versions of The 4-Hour Workweek to give away. I’ll select one random commenter (I’ll email the winner on Friday, 1/29) to send it to free of charge, so long as you answer the entire question:
Would you do it? Why or Why not?
If you’ve followed this blog for a while, you may have noticed that I stick to a consistent posting schedule, publishing new blog posts every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I’ve read that consistency is an important factor in the success of one’s blog, which is why I make sure to always set aside time on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday to write. However, there’s a lot more involved with my posting schedule in regards to what I write, how I write and when I publish certain articles. I’d like to share that with you today.
This is, obviously, something that I’ve come up with for my own blog that may not be suitable for all bloggers. But – as always, I’m happy to share with you the tips, tricks and techniques that I use that have helped me achieve some success. As you read through this, you may want to think about how to adapt a similar approach to what you publish on your blog.
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On Wednesday, I had written my most discussed blog post ever: How to REALLY Profit From Your Blog. In less than 24 hours there were over 100 comments, which is pretty incredible. Thanks to those of you who have contributed to the conversation and even added your own thoughts and personal experiences to the post.
After I hit the 100 comment mark earlier today, I had received no less than a dozen emails from some of you asking me exactly how I get so many people to comment on my posts. Part of the reason is because my community of readers are AWESOME, but also because of certain strategies that I use, which I coincidentally recorded a YouTube video about earlier this week.
Please feel free to watch Tricks to Get More Comments on Your Blog on YouTube (opens a new window):
What Else Can You Do To Get More Comments?
What other strategies or tactics have you used or heard of to get more people readers involved and commenting?
Thanks, and have a great weekend!
Last week, a good friend of mine asked me out to lunch. He said he was dying to discuss a potential internet business idea and wanted my honest opinion. Naturally, I accepted.
I was excited, not only because we were having sushi, but because I love helping people, especially those who I can tell have that drive and passion to succeed. Many people ask me about what I do online, but only a handful actually ask me how to setup an LLC or use Google Optimizer to increase conversion rates.
At lunch, after some catching up and small chit-chat, I finally asked him, “So what’s this business idea of yours?”
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Most of you know that family is my number one priority, especially with the recent birth of my son who is now 25 days old. Most, if not all of the decisions I make from now on are done so with him in mind.
However, I’m still a dude, and dudes love their toys. My dream toy is an Audi R8, a car that I first saw in a commercial during the 2008 Super Bowl. I don’t remember the score of the game, or even where it was played, but I do remember that car. I’ve wanted it ever since.
To quote Left Lane News, the Audi R8 has “…a 420 horsepower high-revving V8 engine and all-wheel-drive. It uses the mid-engine Lamborghini Gallardo platform positioning it squarely against the BMW M6, Porsche 911, and Aston Martin Vantage.”
The base price for this bad boy is $114,200 USD.
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A screenshot is a snapshot of something you see on your computer screen. If you’re doing any kind of online business or blog, more than likely you’re going to want to use a screenshot for some reason.
I use screenshots a lot. You can see a number of them in my last post, where I took screenshots of my statistics from Google Analytics to support the information in my post. Whenever someone emails me and asks me how to do something, I often take a screenshot of the process and drag that into the email itself.
If you have a virtual assistant, and you want to make sure they do whatever it is you want them to do correctly, there’s no better way than to have them visually see a step by step snapshot of exactly where they are supposed to go and what their supposed to click.
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So far, I’ve written 15 Monthly Income Reports, but I’ve never written about my traffic – until today. Instead of just “showing you the numbers”, I hope I can provide you with some insight as to why the numbers are the way they are, and what can we learn from them. Thanks to those of you who emailed me asking me to write about my traffic.
Note: all screenshots taken from Google Analytics (data since October 2008 for The Smart Passive Income Blog)
Overall Traffic
Here’s a snapshot of my traffic since I started this blog:
A few important things to take away from this graph:
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In a little over a year, this blog alone has earned me $6,931.97.
Compared to my other online businesses, that’s not very much at all – but considering I don’t sell anything on this blog and have only 4 125×125 ads (below the fold) in the sidebar, I’d say that’s pretty darn good. My point here is that you don’t have to aggressively sell or advertise to your audience in order to earn some decent cash on your blog. You can do it by being honest and smart with your affiliate links.
Some critics might say that I probably could have earned more. Maybe if I placed Google adsense within my posts. Maybe if I had more advertisements in the sidebar. Maybe if I had text link ads. Maybe if I did product review posts.
I disagree.
All of those things take away from the main focus of this blog (which is the main focus that ALL blogs should have) – the content. If you write excellent content – things that get people excited, things that people haven’t seen before, things that make people want more – you’ll have the potential (and more importantly, the foundation) to make money online.
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The end of a blog post is just the beginning.
What I mean by this statement is that a lot of a blog’s success is not only determined by what you write, but what some of your readers do after they finish reading what you write.
Blog readers are divided into two groups: those who just read, and those who read and take action. One isn’t better than the other (since our primary goal is to reach and teach as many people as possible), but it’s obvious which group of people help to accelerate a blog’s success.
So how do we convert the “just readers” to become those who take action? We don’t.
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No, I'm not a millionaire, but I am living off of passive income made online. I'm here to show 
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