The Only Type of MMO Site You Should Buy

In my last post – Apparently This Is How You Really Make Money Online – Or Is It? – I talked about the new popular trend of buying and selling blogs, and how that is basically a stupid thing to do for either side. I also mentioned there was an exception to this where it is a good idea to buy a blog or static website. That is what I am going to discuss here…

If you are planning to buy a blog or a website then you need to buy one that is highly ranked for competitive keyword phrases in its niche. If it’s a site about making money online or home based business then you want it to be ranked for a lot of keyword phrases related to that. This is because search engine traffic is free, long term, not dependent on your writing style or personality, and won’t require any work on your part since the rankings have already been built up. If it doesn’t have high search engine rankings then you are wasting your money!

For example; I have a website that is ranked for just about every keyword phrase you could think of related to home based business, work at home, and make money online. Almost all the traffic comes from search engines with most of it from Google. If you bought that site from me the traffic would stay exactly the same and the money it earns would not drop at all.

The reason it would continue to make the same amount of money for the new owner is because the traffic, profits, and popularity are completely independent of me. My personality doesn’t matter. My writing style doesn’t matter. My knowledge of making money online doesn’t matter. My subscriber count doesn’t matter. My popularity among internet marketers and bloggers doesn’t matter. Nothing about me matters. The site has the rankings and the traffic and money comes from those rankings.

This is not usually the case with most blogs. At least it hasn’t been with the blogs I have seen sold lately. Most of them don’t have good rankings for important keywords. Their traffic and money mainly comes from RSS subscribers and other bloggers, and they are highly dependent on the owner of the blog for one reason or another.

But don’t get me wrong, there are blogs that could also be sold and continue to get similar levels of traffic and earnings. It just has to be a blog that has good search engine rankings. For instance, the blog you are reading right now, Can I Make Big Money Online, is ranked very highly for keyword phrases like: make money online, make money, how to make money online and many more. Those are competitive keywords that get a lot of searches so the traffic would continue to come in even if this blog was sold.

Also, if you are the one selling a site or blog with high rankings you don’t have it on your conscience that you just robbed someone out of $10,000 or whatever you sold your blog for. You can sleep at night knowing that the person who bought your site is getting their money’s worth.

Another good thing about being the seller of a site like this is that you can do it over and over again to keep making money. It’s a lot easier to build up the search engine rankings of a website for a few competitive keywords than it is to build up a highly popular A-list blog with thousands of RSS subscribers. You can do this a few times a year and keep making big money on each sale. Whereas a highly popular blog usually takes at least a year or more to build up, if you can even do it at all.

Basically the biggest point I am trying to get across here is that if you are going buy a blog or a website make sure it’s one that has high search engine rankings for top keywords in its niche. And a lesser point I am trying to make is that if you are going to build a business out of selling sites then don’t try to build up A-list blogs to sell.

So, the next time you see a blog or website for sale that you may be interested in buying, don’t look at the RSS count, technorati ranking, how many posts it has or how many comments each post gets. For the most part, you should really only be worrying about how highly it is ranked for competitive keywords in its niche and how much traffic it gets from search engines.

Setting Milestones For Business

Online entrepreneurs have something in common. Our desire to succeed has made us take our financial destiny into our own hands with the idea of becoming financially successful one day.

While success can mean many things for each of us, a common measure of success is managing to become financially independent of an offline job and have the freedom of working from home. While working from home is generally associated with the American dream, many entrepreneurs fail to set proper milestones in their business to get ahead.

It is too easy to become complacent while things are going well, but not setting targets that help us to grow would be like committing business suicide.

The first step is always the hardest since it often involves a tremendous amount of courage, trust in our abilities and mojo to get even started.

Fear of failure holds back many would be entrepreneurs and unfortunately this common human trait will hold these folk back from ever experiencing the power of failure. Yes, that wasn’t a misprint since failure is ultimately responsible for our successes. Without failure we very rarely grow and without growth, there won’t be any success.

Depending on what business you are involved in, you will have to set different milestones on your journey to financial abundance. To give you an idea, I have listed the goals I achieved along the way so far and how I advanced my own business by striving to meet them step by step:

• Starting my own freelancing business – check!
• Earning $1,000 month – check!
• Earning a full time income (minimum of $2,000/month) – check!
• Becoming a pro-blogger – check!
• Networking with other writers and webmasters – check ongoing!
• Taking on other writers (outsourcing) – in progress…
• Earning enough to help my husband quit his job – in progress…
• Building niche sites to pay me residual income for years to come – in progress…
• Working mornings only, while living “my dream life” for the rest of each day – in progress

Ultimately, the last statement is my largest dream. Being able to run my business from anywhere in the world and not having to work all day long every day. My dream is to earn enough money for both myself and my husband and be financially free to work anywhere I please, living the lifestyle of an LIP.

Here is what you can do to determine your very own business milestones.

I’m sure you’ve heard the terms:

• short term planning
• medium term planning
• and long term planning before

These are common denominations when it comes to setting goals and getting things done. The thing is, while for one of you short term means this week, for others it means the next three months.

It really is hard to throw all into the same bucket and depending on the nature of your business, short term really does mean today. If you are in an industry that deals with fast changes like money, real estate or trends for example, today’s hot deal could be stone cold tomorrow. Entrepreneurs in these particular industries have to set different goals than a writer like myself.

Also, often our goals have nothing to do with money but a simple measurement.

Measurements are needed regardless of the business you are involved in and could relate to any of the following and anything else for that matter if I have forgotten to mention it here: time, money, grades, recognition, education, positions, the amount of clients you have, the amount of employees you have, etc.

I’m sure you understand what I mean by now. Unless we use some kind of measure in which to advance our business with, it will be really hard to move ahead.

Measurements evoke another most important attribute. This attribute is called focus.

Without focus most of us would barely be able to earn a dime to support ourselves online, let alone our family. Focus is what gets us out of bed in the morning and keeps us pushing on toward yet another goal when the going gets tough.

As you can see, setting milestones is barely the first step we take when we embark into entrepreneurship. Milestones are a constant evolving matter that power us toward the dreams we always had.

The Key To Buying Pre-Owned Domain Names

Buying pre-owned domain names can be a real pain in the behind. Why? Because it is VERY time consuming if you do the research right. The whole concept behind acquiring domains that are pre-owned is to:

• Not have an issue with Google’s sandbox
• Hopefully get some indexed pages
• If lucky get page rank

These factors alone make it all worthwhile to spend a few hours trolling the TDNAM website. TDNAM is GoDaddy’s very own domain name after market. Many bloggers and website owners don’t even know that buying a domain name here can save you potentially months of hard work in trying to get listed in Google’s search engines for a targeted keyword.

In recent months I have gotten more and more familiar with pre-owned domains and I wanted to show you what I do, when my fingers itch.

Hopefully this will help some of you do the same and snatch up some cool domains for a bargain.

How to start:

First of all, I don’t spend more than $50 on any domain ever. I think it is just crazy for a small business owner to do this. Most of the time I buy these domains for $5 plus the yearly registration fee of $9.95 minus the voucher I always find.

The reason I buy these domains is because of my niche sites. Sometimes I go with a brand new one and risk falling into the sandbox after a while and at other times I buy a pre-owned or previously expired domain. This really depends on the actual keyword and how much it pays.

When I search for my domains I always insert the keyword into the search box in TDNAM. There are four ways in which you can choose your search term:

1. Exact Match
2. Begins With
3. Contains
4. Ends With

From those options I normally start off with Begins With. The reason being is that I like my URL to begin with my keyword as this gives me a little more Google juice.

Do you need to have your keyword in your URL?

No you don’t. Contrary to popular belief, you can use any URL to rank just about for anything given you have enough incoming links and age. Yes, you can rank a keyword with a brand new blog, but the listing won’t hold. It might stay there for a day if you are lucky and then disappear again.

But personally I always prefer to have my keyword in the URL because it certainly helps me to outrank others in a very competitive field if put one on one.

What to look for:

If you are new to this, I suggest you check out closeouts and ending soon listings first. Those will give you a good idea on what the going rate is for certain domains and what to look out for.

In the end, it is up to you on which domain you choose if you do at all. But here come the helpful tips that will hopefully stop you from buying crappy domains forever.

Tips you need to know:

1. Go to Google and check each promising domain on whether it has any indexed or cached pages. You can insert this into the search box on Google site:yourdomain.com If it does, GREAT. Make a note of the particular URL of that page and keep this for reference once you own the domain. You will want to recreate that same URL again to help you with search engines.
2. Check whether the site has any page rank. If it does, good. But this isn’t necessary for the success of the site right now.
3. Now visit WhoIs and check for two things: one, you want to know how old the domain is (preferably 2 years minimum) to be out of the sandbox for sure and two check whether the domain has been blacklisted. If it has, keep your fingers off!

Once you have checked all these factors and all looks great, buy the domain. Congrats, you just scored yourself a great platform on which to build a niche site.

A note: To be eligible to bid for domains on TDNAM you’ll have to pay a small yearly membership fee. From memory it is below $5. Also, if you do bid on a domain and paid for it and all, you’ll only take ownership of the domain once the listing runs out.

The owner will also reserve the right to renew the domain again if they wish which means that you won’t be able to use it. In that case you obviously will get a refund.

Anyway, buying domains on TDNAM is great fun, although very time consuming so don’t get too addicted.

Keep Your Priorities Straight

When you start an online business it’s easy to let your priorities get out of balance. One of my biggest weaknesses is staying balanced. That is why every now and then I like to write about staying balanced.

It is easy to let work and business take an unhealthy priority in your life and this is especially true when you are trying to make a living online. It is easy to put in that extra hour on the computer and skip that game of basketball you were planning on playing with your kid. It’s easy to stay up late at night working on your social networking profile and be too tired the next day to take time out of your day to write your spouse that love note you were going to surprise him/her with. It’s easy to work an extra hour writing that blog post, instead of working out at the gym…

You need to keep your priorities straight while you try to make money online. Otherwise you will risk losing the things that are most important to you.

Which brings me to a change in my priorities for the next few months…

The last 4 weeks I (and my family) have been fighting off colds and the flu. I have decided that in order to take care of things that I need to take care of before our baby is born in May, I am going to being spend much less time online the next two months.

I am not going to be spending as much time writing for the next two months. However, I will still be taking submissions for guest posts. Also, Ryan, Monika, and Trent will still be posting regularly on this blog.

You will still great advice on this blog, just not as much of it will be coming from me the next two months.

Keep your priorities straight… you and your loved ones will be glad that you did!

How To Pick The Right Niche For Your Online Business

In the previous post in my getting started series we talked about the importance of knowing what you want. In this post we are going to discuss how to pick the right niche for your online business.

A while back I wrote about how to pick the right niche for your blog. The same process can be used to pick the right niche for your online business. Here is a quick outline of the steps you need to take (you can read all the details here):

1. Make A List Of Your Passions

2. Make A List Of Things You Do Well

3. Merge The First Two Lists

4. Choose Your Favorite 3-5 Niches

5. Determine The Traffic Potential

6. Determine The Money Making Potential

7. Make Sure You Have Time For The Niche

The Most Important Things To Remember When Choosing The Right Niche For Your Online Business

You should choose a niche in a target market that you CAN and WANT to spend a LONG time serving. While you can have online success by going from one niche to another and you can have online success by creating products in niches that you are not passionate about it is much easier to build a business by sticking with one niche market that you LOVE and catering to that target market. I am going to say that again , because it is SO important:

It is much easier to build a business by sticking with one niche market that you LOVE and catering to that target market.

To help target the right niche, you need to decide who your ideal customer is. You can do this by answering the following question:

Who will I enjoy serving?

Target your online business for a niche you would LOVE to serve (click here to read a previous post I wrote about the importance of choosing your customer first).

You want your online business to be enjoyable and easy. One of the best ways to do that is stick with a niche you are passionate about.

If you REALLY want to make big money online AND enjoy it, then do what you LOVE.

Planning The Online Business Of Your Dreams

How To Plan The Online Business Of Your Dreams

In the first post in my getting started series we talked about the importance of planning out the business of your dreams. Before you come up with a business plan you have to know what you want to accomplish with an online business.

In other words the first step to creating the online business of your dreams is to define the online business of your dreams.

You can’t create the online business of your dreams if you don’t know what it looks like!

The best way to define your ideal online business is to ask yourself questions that will help you create a clear vision of your ideal online business.

Here is a small sample of the kinds of questions you should ask yourself:

• Why am I starting a business?
• Why do I want to make money online?
• What am I willing to do to make money online?
• How much money do I want to make per year with my online business?
• How many hours a day do I want to work?
• Do I like to deal with customers?
• What are my strengths and weaknesses?

When you ask AND answer questions like the above question you can get a picture of your ideal online business. With that picture in mind, you are well on your way to creating the online business of your dreams.

PS. Here is a bonus question for those of you who are religious:

What online business can I create that will best serve God?

What Is The First Step For Starting A Successful Online Business?

What is the first step you should take when starting an online business?

Many of us (myself included) start our quest to make money online by reading about it. You will read about SEO, Internet marketing, making money on eBay, making money with affiliate marketing, and anything else you can find to help you make money online. You might buy one or more info products about making money online. Then after learning how to make money online for a while you will either:

1. Purchase a web domain and start setting up the website to make money using the knowledge you have gained.
2. Continue to read and read about Internet marketing and never take any action on your knowledge.
   
3. Make a sound business plan and then take action on that plan to build a successful online business.
   
4. Make a sound business plan and then NEVER take action on that plan.

Which of these paths do you think is the best way to get started online?

The answer, of course, is number 3.

3. Make a sound business plan and then take action on that plan to build a successful online business.

If you start trying to make money online without a plan then you will never know where you are trying to go. You might get there on accident, but it is better to have that defined up front. In other words, choice number 1 is not ideal, but it is MUCH better than choices 2 and 4.

With choice number 2 you gain knowledge but never use it. With choice number 4 you make a plan and never act on it. Neither choice 2 or 4 result in an actual online business being created. You would be surprised how many people follow paths 2 and 4.

YOU WILL NEVER MAKE MONEY ONLINE IF YOU DON’T TAKE ACTION!

If you are just starting out trying to make money with an online business, then the first thing you need to do is make a plan for success. Not just any plan, but a good solid plan based on YOUR strenghts, skills, needs, and desires.

In the next post in this series we will delve deeper into planning the online business of your dreams.

Strategic Profits Live In Disney World

As you may already know, I was born and raised in south Florida. I LOVE going to Disney world. In fact, I was there last January with my family and parents (who live in Tampa). The picture above is a picture I took of Cinderella’s castle while we were waiting for the electric light parade to start last year.

Anyway, Rich Schefren is holding a one week Internet marketing conference in Disney World. This conference is very appealing to me because it would give me a really good excuse to go visit Florida AND I would get to learn from some of the top Internet marketers around (Rich Schefren, Jay Abraham, Jeff Walker, Frank Kern…).

If it’s something that interests you, then click here to get all the details about the conference.

Does Youth Rule The Internet?

Last Monday was my 41st birthday and I decided to ask you how old you were. Here are the results so far and my thoughts on this poll:

How old are you?
Under 18: 16 votes (15%)
18-24: 50 votes (46%)
25-34: 19 votes (18%)
35-49: 19 votes (18%)
Over 49: 4 votes (4%)

Total Votes: 108

The results are about what I expected and very similar to the results you get when using the Microsoft demographics tool and type in “make money online” as the search term. In fact here are the results you get from it:

Under 18: (9.82%)
18-24: (33.93%)
25-34: (28.57%)
35-49: (22.77%)
Over 49: (4.91%)

It’s not surprising that most of you reading this blog are under the age of 34 because, quite frankly, people my age and older are much less likely to have the time or desire to make a living online. Also, the younger you are the more likely you are to be on the Internet and to be net savvy. These are important points to remember when you are marketing online.

Be sure to do the demographic research in your niche first. Never assume anything. There are going to be some niches with older demographics. However, in general you will find a younger crowd online. This is VERY important to remember if you want to make BIG money online.

Big Changes Coming In 2008 For This Blog

I mentioned in an earlier post that I was going to be making changes in my business in 2008. One of the changes I have to make for the first few months of 2008 is to spend a lot less time on the Internet. I have quite a few off-line things to take care of and won’t be able to spend as much time online. That means I need to work much more efficiently, which I will talk about more in the future. There are also big changes coming in 2008 for this blog…

So what is going to change on this blog?

Here are two of the big changes you can expect in 2008:

1. More Focus On Teaching
   In 2008 I am going to provide you with more “how to” posts. I plan on providing a lot more information about how to make money online. I know that’s what you want, so that is what I am going to give you.
   


2. New Theme
   My web designer and I are working on a new theme for this blog. I am going to make the blog look more like a website and less like a blog. One of the things I don’t like about blogs is that it is often difficult to find what you are looking for. This is even true of very popular blogs.

There are other changes I will be making in 2008, but I am going to let those be a surprise.

Hope you all have a happy 2008!

PS. These changes are coming in the New Year but because of other obligations I have not placed a time line on the changes yet.

What You Must Remember About Making Money Online

Guest Post by Trent Brownrigg

In the beginning of your quest to make money online you will most likely find yourself more frustrated and lost than you ever have any other time in your life. You will spend all your spare time doing everything you can to start making money with very little results. You might even come to hate yourself for ever getting started, but you decide to try just a while longer.

Something you must remember about making money online is to…

...NEVER GIVE UP!

Why is that?

For most people trying to make money online there is a very steep curve and you should not expect yours to be any different. Your internet income will probably be very little or maybe even non-existent for many months, then it might increase slowly for a while. Then, seemingly out of nowhere it can take a sharp turn upward and continue to increase rapidly.

When it all comes together and all your hard work has finally paid off, the frustration you once felt will seem like nothing more than a bad dream.

That’s when it starts to get really exciting! You can now build on your experience and knowledge to find even more ways to make money. Your business will continue to grow and your income will increase. At this point you will probably be making enough money online to quit your day job.

It’s tough to start making money online; there is no doubt about that. However, most people give up without actually giving it a true effort.

In order to find success online you need to:

1) Always Keep Learning.
The internet changes so fast it’s almost impossible to keep up. What works today may not work tomorrow. You must keep learning.

2) Continue to Work Hard.
Just because you work for yourself does not mean you don’t have to work hard.

3) Develop Your Skills.
Keep ahead of the curve by continually developing your skills to make money online.

4) Ask Questions.
No matter how long you have been around there will always be things you don’t know. Don’t be afraid to ask.

5) Apply Your Knowledge.
There are countless people with all the knowledge they need to make money online but they don’t apply it. Knowing is only part of the battle. You have to take action as well.

Also, keep in mind that there is no such thing as a get rich quick opportunity! You must put in a lot of time and hard work to make money online. But it sure beats working for someone else, doesn’t it?

So, what was the one thing you must remember?

...NEVER GIVE UP!

It won’t be easy but you will get there. Many people fail only because they didn’t realize how close they were to success when they decided to give up. This will never happen to you if you keep at it!

It’s Finally Here…

It’s finally here and, if you act now, you can join for half price!

Are there any online skills you lack but can’t afford to pay a professional to do?

Well, we have the solution for you.

Barter Genius!

Barter has been around since the beginning of time. Over 85% of Fortune 500 companies use barter and you can, too!

Just imagine being able to get the professional help you need without spending lots of money. So many new online business owners don’t have the money or skills to do everything they need to succeed. With Barter Genius you can trade your skills for the skills of others. Not only that, but if you want you can trade your skills for almost anything else imaginable (vacations, clothes, cars, hotel rooms…). You name it, it’s probably available to trade.

How exactly does this work?

Let’s say you have a blog. It’s badly in need of a redesign, but graphics is just not your thing. Your budget for the redesign is, well, non-existant. Do you have to just suffer along with your site’s pathetic look until you can save up enough to pay a graphic designer? Not if you’re a member of Barter Genius! You can log in to your account, offer your killer content creation services for hire and use the credits you receive from that to pay a great graphic designer to completely redo the look of your site, making you and your readers very happy. On top of that, the people who hired you are so thrilled with the content you created for them that you gain their loyal readership and the readership of their friends.

What about the graphic designer? She’s going to turn around and use the credits you paid her to hire someone to do some SEO for her, so that others can find her site (you only found her through Barter Genius, remember?).

Does this sound like a fairy tale? It can be a reality in your life. But you need to hurry and sign up now to get the discount price of $97/year. On January 1st the price will more than double (but it will still be a great value, considering what you get for your money).

So, what are you waiting for?

Visit the website and sign up now!

All the best,
George and Jill Manty

PS. If barter is not for you, don’t worry… we have some exciting new products planned to help you make BIG money online coming out in the near future. Sign up to be on the early waiting list, to keep up with our next secret project.

PPS. We will be announcing a contest very soon that coincides with the launch. Stay tuned for the contest details!

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