Some pigs I saw in the forest this weekend

It’s about time to dissect September and move onto October! The month has started off with weather hotter than summer here, so it’s been hard for me to accept that the end of the year is nigh! But it is, and that means I’ve got a lot of work to do to get my business into a manageable state before I go away. (Edit: Since I wrote this draft, it’s turned cold again and feels like winter!)

September 2011 – Continued Success

I posted in July and August that I had continued to beat my monthly earnings each month. September was around the same as August, just slightly less, so I am happy with the results. That said, I need to work hard to bring in a boost in the next few months. I have some plans up my sleeve to do that – namely, seasonal sites, motivating my PLR affiliates, and working out some very good PLR deals for customers. These things alone will pretty much take up all my time (more about my plans below).

Reflecting On My Business

Although the income was going well, I had a bit of a blip in September when I got overwhelmed. That’s largely why I wrote my post about fear. I started to worry whether my business can survive for a long time, whether the things I do won’t be profitable in future, whether I’ll be able to keep up while I’m away and so on.

One thing that really hit me, however, is that I really need to do something I’m more passionate about. So what I’m going to do is try to give up some niche sites (not completely, and I will of course keep them up for the passive earnings). While I travel, I’m planning to spend time writing more creatively, and seeing whether I can turn one of my blogs into something I’m truly proud of. I am also working on a book to accompany that site.

I think it’ll be a while before I’m comfortable enough to move on from my niche sites, but I have gotten over the fear just by knowing I do have plans to move ahead with more passionate projects.

Plans For October

The number one goal has to be to build my savings. I have enough saved now that I know I’ll be safe if I can’t work as much as I hope when I travel, but it won’t hurt to save more and get systems in place now so that they work for me while I’m away. With that in mind, here are my plans.

1) Narrow Down My Focus

If I’m going to keep things under control when I travel, I can’t keep going the way I am. Things have to go. First on my list, I think, will be PLR Deal Guide. I get sales from it but it’s just not worth the time, and I can’t keep up with near-daily blog posts when I’m away.

Next, I need to come up with a strategy for that one blog I want to put my passion and creativity into improving. For months now I’ve been putting it off, just because the money isn’t instant and I’ve got other things to do. But if I want to do what I really love, I have to make the time for that.

Lastly, I am going to try to plan a few months of PLR releases in advance, and get working on them early. I’ll be coming out with a lot of content from now until Christmas to give me a good financial buffer when I start my travels late December/ early January.

2) Work On Tiffany Dow’s Branding Challenge

When Tiffany first shared the idea of her branding challenge I thought it was an excellent one. It was only a dollar to sign up, so I did, but I did question whether I could justify the time when I have so much on my plate. But what she’s sent out so far is excellent, and it’ll actually help me to figure out what I want in my business, and which areas to cut out. I didn’t expect it to go into that area so much, but now it has I know it’s well worth me following through. I will be blogging about it, too.

3) Book The Flights

Skip this if you’re not interested in my personal plans Last month I mentioned I’d have to give notice to my landlady. That’s been done! We’re moving out on December 13 (or thereabouts). Next, I need to book the flights. I imagine this will be done very soon. I’m currently researching – prices in December are probably the worst all year, but that’s just the way it’s worked out. If all else fails, I’ll take advantage of cheap flights on New Year’s Eve and start the new year somewhere new!

What about you? How was your September and what have you got planned for October?

Here we are at the start of another month and I can’t quite believe we’re two thirds through 2011! September is going to be a busy month for me, there’s no doubt about that! I thought I would post about what’s been going well for me lately, what I’ve been struggling with, and what I have planned for this month (both business and personal).

August 2011 – My Biggest Earnings To Date

Last month I was very happy to report that my July earnings were the best they have been since starting online. This was largely thanks to the launch of my PLR membership site.

With an increase in affiliate commissions in August, alongside a further boost in PLR sales, I’m extremely happy to say that August was even better. I earned just over 30% more profit in August than I did in July – a fantastic jump that I really wasn’t expecting (especially since I significantly increased my outsourcing expenses).

Where did this extra income come from?

• My affiliate earnings have been really picking up (although Adsense is infuriatingly dropping in recent months),
• I am making more affiliate commissions from PLR products (although I’m still unsure as to whether my website PLR Deal Guide is a good idea in the long term),
• I had some very successful PLR packs this month that earned me over $3000 in themselves.

What I Struggled With In August

1) Not Enough Time For Niche Sites

My number one goal is always to make a semi-passive income from niche sites. As you might be able to tell from the above, PLR has somewhat taken over my time. I have been reinvesting money back into writers for my niche sites, and I’ve found that traffic is increasing thanks to daily posting. That said, I need to scale things up. I am making consistent monthly income from my niche sites but still have the same old problem of not having the time to focus. I need to build more sites/ build bigger sites than I currently have.

2) Poor Time Management

When does the struggle of working for yourself ever end? Even after three years (I first started ghostwriting back in August 2008!) I still struggle to keep a balance. In fact, I hate to say I’ve probably been worse than ever this last month! Some days I do next to nothing, others I cram in so much work that I am completely burned out. This is not good and I certainly can’t stay like this if I want to travel and work (fewer hours) from the road.

The only good thing to come out of all this procrastination is the realisation that I can make a good income with few hours of active work. That is if I ever learn to properly limit my work hours!

3) Not Enough Creativity

What I enjoy best about working online is the creative outlet. Even this blog is creative for me. I enjoy writing here, the only problem is I don’t have time. Yes, I can churn out quick, short blog posts. But what I’d really like to do is spend whole afternoons crafting just one blog post. I really want to write something worthwhile. Ahhh, if only I had the time (see my problem in number 2).

One of my niche sites is in a personal development topic. It has good traffic but a lot of the content is poor. I’m slowly improving it and I want to be proud if it, because it’s a topic I have very close personal experience with. My email newsletter is getting a very good response and generating email conversations, but I haven’t set aside enough time to really make this site the way I want it to be. It may not be earning much right now (any ideas on how to monetize personal development – please share right now I promote hypnosis MP3s), but it’s something I can see as a long term creative blog that could really help people.

Plans For September – An Important Month!

Right now, I feel like every month is crucial to making things happen. The fact that I earned 30% more than I expected last month gives me a massive boost to my travel savings. These savings are essentially a buffer should my plan of working and travelling not go to plan. But the pressure is really on now!

1) Release More PLR – At Least 1 PLR Pack Per Week

I don’t do any ghostwriting any more – I enjoy PLR so much more for the fact that I can write what I want, when I want. The business is very up and down, though, in the sense that some packs can earn me a paltry couple of dollars per 500 word article, where my best packs have earned me around $70 for every article. Thankfully my average across all my articles is now climbing all the time.

The thing is, I do continue to make sales of older packs all the time. My plan is to get as many out there as possible in the next few months. A bigger inventory means I can satisfy a bigger portion of my visitors and hopefully attract more browsers in general. It also fulfils requests that existing customers have made.

2) Work On My Holiday Sites

I am already very happy with the traffic I’m getting to my Halloween site each day, which I imagine will only grow this month and next, and I’ve had my first Halloween costume sales.

But Christmas is also fast approaching, so I’m going to be working on my main Christmas site at the same time. It seems to have been hit with some Google penalty but not de-indexed. It had been doing nicely until a few weeks ago. I stopped adding new content – so my plan is to start doing what I’ve done with my Halloween site. Adding one post a day there has made a huge impact on its own, so I’ll see whether this works for my holiday site too.

Whatever happens, I’m just so glad I have some sites with age this Christmas. Last year I left it very late and didn’t have the time to put much of worth together. This year is different (hopefully!)

3) Set A Leaving Date (!!!)

My heart is pretty much starting to race as I write this. In all honesty I’m scared of giving notice on my flat, not having my own place in England and going off to somewhere completely foreign, doing something I’ve never done before. But the landlady has been in touch and wants to know whether we’ll be renewing. I’m hoping she’ll let us stay either for one extra month (’til November) or two (’til December) and then we’ll be gone!

I know many others in our situation would have set the date long ago – but it’s been difficult. The other half is finishing his MA and has enough to think about without quitting his job and thinking about travel just yet (I’m doing all the planning). But as soon as that’s done (end of the month) he can quit (scary!) and we’ll book the tickets. It’s very much in the spirit of what we want to do anyway: much will be left unplanned. We’ll book a one-way ticket to Bangkok, spend a few nights in a guesthouse and see where life takes us.

By the end of the month, I should be able to say when we’re going, and hopefully be clued up on all the visas and vaccinations we’re going to need. I’m also planning to document the whole planning process, and maybe turn it into a guide/blog presuming I can figure it out!

How was August for you? I’d love to hear your goals for September too!

Ok, I admit I am a little late with this one. In fact, this post has been sitting in my drafts since the beginning of the month, so it’s high time I posted the update. I wanted to post about what I did in July, including new business projects as well as completing my personal goals.

Main Tasks For July:

1. Start my first membership website
2. Exercise five days a week

First – My July Activity Challenge

On the first of July I posted about my intention to start being more active. Working at the computer all day every day is certainly not conducive to fitness and good health. I also know that I need to get fit if I’m going to be travelling on a budget (this means a lot of walking and carrying a backpack).

I got off to a good start in the first half of the month. I exercised every day and I quickly got over the muscle aches (which shows I must have been improving). Sadly, it all went downhill after I went to visit family on the 18th. I didn’t keep it up at all!

While this challenge was technically a failure, I have been more active in general. It’s easy to get lazy when you sit down all day. Even though I haven’t exercised properly in the second half of the month, I’ve been walking almost every day. I really need to get back into doing more, though!

Second – Launching My First Membership Site

For months and months now I’ve been thinking about launching a membership site, but I always had the idea that there wasn’t anything I could offer. I finally did launch a site in July!

If you’ve read some of my posts before then you may remember that I want to travel before the end of the year. I’ll keep working on my online business as I go, but it helps if I have recurring income. This is why I made the decision that I just needed to do it and stop putting it off.

I’m glad I did it – it’s added a good amount of money to my monthly income. In fact, July 2011 was my best ever month. What’s important, though, is that it’s regular income – even though it’s not guaranteed, it is somewhat regular and the work is flexible.

I’ll get into more about the process of starting the site in another post (probably a long one!) but for now my point is that I’m so glad I took action to do something I’d been putting off for so long! When I decided to do it I worked so hard to make it happen within a matter of weeks. Although it presented some challenges, it really wasn’t so bad!

What’s Next For Me

Although it doesn’t show yet, I have plans to start offering way more in the way of useful, free content here. I may not be perfect, and have made a lot of mistakes, but I’m trying to build my confidence in the fact that I do have something valuable to share.

One post I have planned is to share everything I know about selling PLR, and I want to make it a free post much in the style of bloggers I admire such as Zen Duck Dave. I know this post won’t be directly relevant to many of you, but I’m hoping there’ll be something useful you can take away even if you’re not into PLR.

Why do I want to head in this direction? In truth, because I enjoy it. I’ve started to realize just how much I’ve been procrastinating on certain tasks. They all have one thing in common – I don’t enjoy them. The problem is that it’s hard to make money from what I do enjoy, but I’m going to try and spend time on both if possible.

I know my title isn’t exactly the best or most exciting for a blog post, but I thought it was about time for an update on my July exercise challenge, and I also wanted to tell you about a new challenge I’m taking part in.

The Activity Challenge

To recap, I planned to exercise 30 minutes a day at least 5 days a week this month. Being active at this stage does include going for walks, but also working out on my Wii Fit. I have to start small as I’m going from virtually no activity! I haven’t missed a day so far, and most days I’ve completed my workout and gone for a short walk on top of that.

How The Exercise Has Made Me Feel

For a few days I was aching BADLY but this seems to have passed a little. I am probably going to step things up this week or next, as I get used to the level of activity I’ve been doing.

I’m also very tired, in both a good and a bad way. Now I know I’m not doing much according to many people’s definition of exercise, but for me I’ve basically gone from nearly every day of sitting around to doing things every day. I really like feeling properly tired when I go to bed each night. This is something I wasn’t getting so much recently due to too much time spent on the computer.

In short, the exercise plan is going well so far, and I feel good physically and mentally for having started it. I just need to push myself and keep it up every day.

Joining In On A New Writing Challenge

Yesterday Tiffany Dow launched a new challenge for PLR writers, and she also discounted the cost of her PLR ATM course to mark the occasion. The challenge is to write PLR every day (you decide how much).

NOTE: If you do want to take advantage of the PLR ATM discount, I am giving a bonus when you buy through my link. Read more by clicking here.

Personally, I know I can complete at least 30 PLR articles in the next month since I have to for my new membership site and other things I have planned. But I decided to take part in the challenge to make sure I write at least 1 article every day – this will help me spread it out over the month and perhaps write a little more than I had planned.

If you’re interested in my product review PLR membership site, you can click here to take a look and use the coupon code ‘newmember’ to save 50% off the monthly price.

I know that most of my readers don’t necessarily write PLR, but whatever you’re up to, let me know your progress (especially those who were keen to join my in my activity challenge )

I can’t quite believe 2011 is half over. I say it every month, like a broken record, but honestly – where has June disappeared to? Now it’s almost July I thought it was time to do some honest reflection on how things are going for me in 2011. (I was going to post this on July 1, but I’ve decided to post about my new “challenge” that day instead, so watch out for that).

The First Half of 2011 Has Been Rocky

I am not going to lie. After a very strong end to 2010 (my best ever in my IM career), the first few months of 2011 were very rocky. I made what I thought was the right decision to go away to the Caribbean for two and half weeks. I had a great time, and a two and a half week holiday shouldn’t bee too disruptive except for the fact that the flat I was renting got sold while I was away, and I had to find a new place to live (my third place in the space of a year), then move, by April.

After I moved here it took me perhaps another couple of weeks to settle into my routine. During this period of a few months from mid-January to May my business suffered a lot. But some good things came out of it too. My “active” income was down for a while, but my affiliate income was higher than ever, and has continued to grow since then. I also continued to move forward by starting an affiliate program for my PLR – a huge milestone for me! Since May, and through June, things have been picking up speed again.

Did I Stick To My New Year Goals?

I posted my goals for 2011 back in January, so I thought it’d be interesting to compare them to what I’m up to now. Surprisingly, I’ve stuck to many of my resolutions…

Niche Websites: I said I would work on three sites, and I still am! Although the sites changed. Only one site was one of the three I mentioned in January. The other two are older sites that I’m trying to revamp (makes sense since these have the benefit of age, some content and some traffic). I am also pleased to say I am far more patient with these sites now and am not rushing at the expense of quality, or moving on too quickly. Things that have changed or still need changing:

• I don’t work on building backlinks like I used to, though this isn’t to say I’ve stopped completely. But this month and last month I’ve been focusing on building traffic without Google (more on that to come maybe next week).
• And despite cutting down my focus, I still find it difficult to put in the effort I need to. I definitely haven’t stuck to my 5,000 word writing goal!

PLR: I’m still trying to release regular PLR packs, and am actually launching my PLR membership site in July (if you’re interested in a very big discount, sign up to my newsletter before next week!) This takes up a huge amount of time and I really need to start outsourcing marketing sites. I am pleased to say I have grown my list a lot this year already, and launched my affiliate program PLR earnings are still up and down, though.

Managing My Time: This one I haven’t been great at. I still find it hard to manage all my different projects, which suggests I may need to cut down (and hire help!) I’m thinking of cutting back my internet marketing blogs. I have this site, my How to Sell PLR site, and PLR Deal Guide. I may combine this site with how to sell PLR (and I also want to completely change this site around), and continue posting on the deal site this month and re-evaluate whether it’s worth my time after that.

Personal Goals: It’s a good thing that things are looking up the last couple of months as I still want to try and travel before the end of the year. This is looking pretty difficult at the moment, but I refuse to believe it’s not possible. That’s something that working in IM has taught me

My General Outlook

I kind of feel like my IM career is maturing. I started out like a child trying everything and anything, not thinking about the future just what was working right now. My career is now going through its adolescence and my general outlook, both for PLR and niche sites, is this:

To genuinely help people achieve what they want to achieve, and what my websites promise to help them achieve. And to do this in line with my core ethical values.

In fact, what I really want to do is give away information for free. I know people will think I’m crazy but I just genuinely want to provide some value without hyping it up or charging for it. Problem is, will people see the value if it’s free? And how do I make a living off that? I guess I’ll be trying to figure that out in the next few months

As you can see, my 2011 has been a mixed bag, full of ups and downs. How has 2011 been going for you? I would really love to hear in the comments!

As I said in my last post, I’ve been finding it hard to focus lately, so I thought that writing a post about my goals for March would help to keep things on track.

Building My List

I really need to build my list each and every month, so this month I’m creating some freebies and launching some squeeze pages for different seasonal PLR packs. The freebies take quite a lot of time, but I’m using some content I wrote earlier so in total I have to:

• Write 6 original articles for the freebie article pack (4 are articles I’ve already written),
• Put together keyword research lists to include with the articles,
• Create three WordPress themes using Artisteer to complement the topics,
• And write four new PLR articles for my weekly “Free PLR Friday” emails.

The good news is that, once I have the freebies ready, the squeeze pages don’t take long to put together since I have a template. I’ll be setting up four of these different pages this month (if you’re interested, I got the full workings of the idea from Melissa Ingold’s Sweetie Marketing Insider December 2010 edition – a fantastic program if you have a business like my PLR site).

Releasing New PLR

I’m hoping to bring in some new PLR customers using the methods above, so I also want to have some great deals set up to help entice them to buy. As of writing, I just released a 15 article pack on March 1, but I still have to:

• Write 2x 15 article packs to sell as special offers on the Warrior Forum,
• Put together a 40 article mega pack to be released in a few months – I have to do this early as I’m sending it to someone who will hopefully be scheduling it in to send out the offer to their list.

I would have liked to do some of my smaller PLR releases too, but it’s honestly just way too much work for me to do so I’ll get back to doing that in April.

My Niche Websites

I honestly don’t normally work this much on my PLR sites every month, but because of launching an affiliate program in Feb and being away for so long I’ve had to prioritize it for the month of March. This means I haven’t had much time to work on my affiliate sites, except for writing articles to build backlinks whenever I have a free moment. So I’m not going to overwhelm myself here. I’ve decided I need to:

• Post up one detailed product review to the main niche site I’m working on at the moment. The traffic is building from long tail keywords, but there really isn’t much content on it at the moment so I really need to add a bit!
• Go through one of my other sites and change over all the Commission Junction links to Amazon product links.
• And I’ll still continue to write articles for backlinks whenever I can.

Conclusion

Although I haven’t finished going through all the tasks I’ll need to be doing for the various aspects of my businesses, I feel better knowing that I’ve got all this planned so I know what to do with myself every day! I’ll report back at the end of the month on my progress.

If you’ve made some specific goals for March and don’t mind sharing them then I’d love to hear them in the comments below!

I have been putting off writing about my December earnings. Why? Because I’ve started having doubts again about posting my earnings. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I’ll just point you to this post and this post where I mentioned the issue.

In short, posting earnings doesn’t always make me happy. Sometimes it does, and it certainly makes me happy if it does inspire anyone, but it also makes me feel like I’m not where I “should be” sometimes. So I’ve decided now not to bother posting about them. I may still quietly update my earnings page, as I really like having this record, but I’m not going to post about them monthly. I’ll post whenever I reach important milestones, though.

What I Achieved In December

I feel like I achieved a lot in December. Although my earnings don’t necessarily reflect this, I feel that I know for sure how to make a lot more money next December in time for Christmas. Why? I put up around 30 toy-related Hubs for Christmas at the end of November and they lead to my highest Amazon earnings month. My earnings weren’t that high by many standards, but it was a first for me and I am 100% sure I can use what I learned in December 2010 to make December 2011 a lot better.

Here’s a screenshot of my Amazon earnings:

Compared to anything I’ve ever earned on Amazon before, this is a huge step up. Especially since it was mainly from Hubs and not websites. I really will be prepared for next Christmas!

Aside from Amazon, I’d say my other earnings weren’t great. I still made Adsense payout, but I honestly think I’ve been “smart priced” – the price I get for some clicks is just a joke (e.g. 1p for 2 clicks or something stupid). And I’m not focused too much on Clickbank anymore after I sold most of my sites, so I’m thankful for what I did get.

My Two Week Productivity Challenge Update After 3 Days

On Wednesday I posted about my 6,000 words a day challenge for the next two weeks. 6,000 words is a lot to write – especially when I’ve got to write things like PLR and make sure they’re all properly proofread! – but the goal is doing its job and really pushing me to work harder.

Here’s a quick screenshot of how I’ve done this week (I’ve only been doing my 6,000 for the last three days):

I know for a fact I’ve done more than I would have done otherwise. I feel like stopping but then I think to myself “I’ll just quickly write a blog post for 400 words” or “Why don’t I write an article to promote that blog post I just wrote?”. This is great as it’s getting me continuously putting content out there!

I have also found it’s helping me to balance time well between my PLR site and my niche sites (the two main goals I mentioned for 2011). I just basically have a list of all the content that needs writing for the next two weeks, and I pick and choose what I feel like doing in that moment. Mixing up between the two has made it more interesting.

Lastly, another thing I’ve noticed is that it’s helped me with my personal goal of finishing at a more definite time. For some reason, even though I’m working harder, knowing I have a fixed goal is what allows me to stop working once I meet it

So overall I’m feeling happy. I’ll update you again next week!

Over the last few days I’ve been quietly thinking about what I want to do and what I need to do to make sure 2011 is the year I stop worrying about every penny I spend, and to start fulfilling my goal to travel.

Internet Marketing Goals

I’ve put my work into two categories:

1. Niche sites,
2. My PLR site.

It really does seem so simple when I put it like that! Truth is it isn’t quite that simple at the moment. Right now I also still do UAW services for people. I’ve decided to stop this. The only service I will provide is a UAW submission where the client provides all the writing – all I do is submit.

So back to the two areas I’m focusing on for 2011…

1) Niche Sites

At the moment I’ll be working on three niche sites that will become authorities. They should make sales throughout the year but come Christmas they will explode (that’s the plan, anyway!)

• I’ll write good quality, informative posts.
• I’ll be so much more focused that I’ll actually have time to get really deep into these niches and genuinely know what I’m talking about (I’ve already gotten started on this one for two of the sites).
• I’ll look at what works and expand on that, and leave sites or products that just don’t covert (in this respect, what I’m working on is bound to change).
• I will set a writing target each day (e.g. 5,000 words) and I will write content, mainly for backlinks, until I meet that target and more.
• I will finish work by a reasonable hour and relax for the evenings.
• Above all – I will NOT overcomplicate things or get distracted by “gurus” selling the next best thing. I will focus and realize that it takes time but it also takes hard work. It will happen this year.

2) My PLR Site

I’ll simply carry on doing what’s working but expand by adding new packs. The good thing about PLR is that the more packs your site has, the more your business can snowball into something bigger without necessarily putting in extra hours.

• I’ll use what I know about backlinking to get my PLR site really out there in the search engines.
• I will set up an affiliate program for my PLR (hopefully this month!).
• I’ll use my own product-related PLR (if relevant) and rewrite it to make even more money from the content.
• I’ll carry on building a relationship with people on my list.
• I’ll carry on growing my list through various techniques that I’ve been reading about lately.

3) Dividing My Time

With such different projects as the niche sites and the PLR business, I will have to come up with a plan to divide my time between the two. This may mean working two days a week on PLR, and three days a week on the niche sites. I’m not quite sure yet – it all depends how things go, what works best and what I feel I need to do.

I know that not working full time on either project will make progress slower, but it’s good to keep the balance between things I know can earn money fast (PLR) and things that secure passive income for the future (niche sites + PLR too).

As my business grows I am also going to outsource more and more tasks, which will free up more time to work on what really counts.

Personal Goals

I had to mention some of my personal goals, as these really are completely intertwined with my internet marketing goals. Number 1, I am going to use my passive income to help me travel and live around the world. No plans set in stone yet, I just know I want to do it now before I settle down and have a family.

My partner is finishing his MA this year and does want to do a PhD – if he manages to get funding then it might be an opportunity we can’t refuse, meaning we couldn’t just up and leave – so travel might have to take the form of shorter holidays instead. But if not, or if I have enough money to fund his PhD (you never know!), we’ll be living the ultimate “location-independent” IM lifestyle for a little while.

Aside from that I’m going to simplify. Like I said before, I could get my two month’s notice to leave the flat at any time. Moving is so stressful that I want to do what I can to ease that. So I’m going to seriously de-clutter and minimize what I own. This will also make it easier to meet my travel goals, and help me to think more about the environment and the way I consume products.

Happy New Year!

I had meant to post this a few days ago, but for some reason I just couldn’t get around to writing it. For a start I’ve been feeling a little sorry for myself after coming down with a cold and sickness for the end of 2010, but I’ve also been a little worried about other things. I apologize in advance if it isn’t as coherent as I’d like it – this was the best I could do in my fuzzy-brained state.

What’s Worried Me

On December 22nd we were told our flat is being put up for sale by our landlord. This is the flat we only moved into four months ago, a flat we really like and haven’t even had time to properly enjoy yet. This really isn’t the best news – moving twice in the space of under a year is pretty stressful. Not to mention expensive with all the fees and time off work. But I’m trying to turn this around into something positive (more about that later).

What Changed In 2010?

I was also feeling a little sorry for myself when I looked back at 2010. When I think back, I feel as though not much has changed. My financial situation is still strained, and I am living the frugal life with a partner who is sacrificing a lot to study what he loves at university (it’s difficult but it is worth it) – although I have always been able to pay for everything I need and then some, without getting into debt.

My business has changed and grown, has become more passive but still not earning as much as I’d like. I stalled a lot, wasted time on building crappy sites, decided to sell off most of my sites a few months ago and never really got going too much after that. When I got into that mode of thinking, I was a little down on myself.

That said, I had to learn things for myself. I had to try and take those shortcuts, clear out the bad sites and then, towards the end of 2010, start to really get a feel for what does work.

In the last few months I experimented with keyword research, using the search suggestions on Google rather than what the keyword tool tells me, or even inventing my own buying phrases for Christmas, and I saw faster results than with anything else I’ve ever tried. Christmas is over so things will be tougher now, but I know what needs to be done and am more flexible in my approach.

My PLR Success

And let’s not forget the success I had with my PLR site. My customer base continues to grow, and I’m building relationships with people through my list. I really love that part of writing PLR, and I love the flexibility of writing what I want to write, when I want to write it, rather than my time being dictated by individual client orders.

For some reason I don’t count my PLR site as passive income, but the truth is it’s a bit of both. It has the potential to become an amazing passive income stream, so I don’t think I should discount my success in this area.

Conclusion

On the whole it’s true that my life did not radically change in 2010, and there are things I’m not too happy about, but I did form more solid ideas about what I personally want to do in life. I didn’t have specific goals about it before, but now I know I want to travel I have a feeling that it’s going to spur me on to do better in 2011. More about that next time when I am hopefully feeling a bit better and feel like I can write in a more engaging way!

I was starting to regret deciding to keep posting my earnings – November started off very badly – but thankfully it picked up and I made over $500 from my niche sites and HubPages again! At this point I am very happy to be earning $500+, and especially since this month saw a new Amazon high!

Click here to see my updated earnings page.

Seasonal Shopping

I tried to make some cash for Halloween but, for one reason or another, it didn’t really work. Thankfully my Christmas efforts are going far better! I only wish I’d been able to start sooner. I started adding Christmas toy HubPages on the middle of November and kept steadily adding more through the month – I have about 35 now.

I wrote about my Hubs in my last post, but in short they rank really fast and seem to convert well. I’m only getting a few visits per day to each Hub but they are getting lots of clicks through to Amazon. And once people click to Amazon they seem to buy extra stuff! Unfortunately for me, most of the things are very low value items, my average commission is probably a dollar! But I am still extremely happy with my progress. Every journey starts with a single step

And I had my highest ever Amazon day – $28.82 on the 29th – I am very happy with that even though it’s small!

Like I said, I do regret not starting sooner, but this is proof that you can start late and still make some money. I’m really hoping to make more in December, so it’s a nice extra bit of cash! And next Christmas I will definitely have a very good idea of what it takes to make even more cash.

Above all it is showing me that things are working! I just need to sell some higher priced items to get my commissions up.

Other Earning Notes

A few Hostgator Black Friday sales did boost my earnings – thanks to anyone who bought through my link! – but I still would have met the $500 without it. My Adsense earnings are still down since I took Adsense off most of my sites, but thankfully I still made £92 (GBP). I always look forward to the Adsense payment each month!

So in short I’m hoping the Amazon trend will continue through December. My main focus is also going to be Amazon as I work on building very big authority sites with lots of backlinks. I really only have a few earning sites at the moment and I’m happy to say what they earn is 100% passive (obviously the Hubs I’ve done this month haven’t technically been passive). But I’m really excited about building true authority sites. I am already finding it SO much easier to focus on just one thing at a time.

What Now?

I’ve been finding it hard to focus for the last few days – maybe it’s the cold weather?? But I’ve also been up and down with the faith I have in myself. I get this often, I am not a very confident person. While I feel I am good at working on my own and I am proud of my business (not so much the slow growth of passive income, but definitely other income sources), I take small comments from outside sources, like family and friends who don’t understand, to heart. So there are ups and downs but ultimately I am proud of what I do, and the desire to prove to my friends and family that this will ultimately be the best thing I can do for my happiness will drive me forward. Feels good to get that off my chest

Anyway, I am working as hard as I possibly can from now until Christmas. I’ll be taking at least a week off around Christmas – going to visit family. Then I’ll be working very hard again until… I go to Barbados near the end of January! I almost decided not to go because I feel I should be working hard, but getting free accommodation and a cheap holiday to such an amazing destination (staying with my uncle who lives there) is an opportunity I couldn’t miss! I remember getting the winter blues really bad in January 2010, so it’s not going to happen again in 2011!

Anyway, I do feel the need to work extra hard to make up for the extravagance of a Caribbean holiday! So I’m not sure how much I’ll be posting, but it will be reduced.

Hope November was a good month for you and December’s even better