Entrepreneurs-Journey.com

I’m in Hawaii now having come up from Fiji on my way to Canada. I’m presently typing this at a cafe on the top floor of the Ala Moana shopping center - the largest mall in Hawaii.

Typing on the third floor of the Ala Moana Center in Hawaii

In response to my recent blog posts written from places around the world, many people expressed a strong desire to emulate what I’m doing now - traveling and working in a functional and balanced manner (just without getting sick like I did!).

I’ve also had a couple of people email me explaining how they are also traveling the world and running their Internet business and how they believe more people could do the same, if only the knowledge of how to do so was out there.

In the spirit of helping others realize their dream of the traveling lifestyle, I’m going to present some tips to help you travel and run a successful business at the same time. I hope these ideas motivate you towards actually beginning the process of planning your trip, rather than constantly dreaming about it and putting it off until you have “more money” or “more time” or whatever belief that holds you back.

I don’t have a family traveling with me and I realize for many of you there are spouses and kids to consider too. Just remember your loved ones are variables you need to accommodate, they should not be reasons for not going, assuming the family are happy to come along.

It’s acceptable to hold off travel until children are out of school or independent, if you don’t want to disrupt their life. However the tips I’m about to present can certainly be applied to summer holidays and most of them apply just as well to any person who runs a business and wants more freedom.

Let’s get to it…

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Recently I was the willing target of several audio interviews. The topic of course, was blogging, however as is customary, most interviews begin with a little background study of the person in question.

As a result of telling my recent business history I found myself reminiscing about some of the ventures I was involved in during the previous 8 years or so. Most of them were online enterprises, but there was one experience where I was running a start-up based in the real world, an English tutoring school called “Aussie Tutor”.

If you dig into my earlier archives you will find several posts and podcasts were I mentioned my English school. It was an interesting time in my life, which taught me many lessons about business and in particular what I want from a business and what I don’t want.

Working 9 to 5 by Choice

While in charge of my school I came to fully realize what I had always known - I do not like having to be anywhere nine-to-five, five days a week.

Before I avoided a full time job specifically because of not wanting to be anywhere for such long periods of time to work for someone else. Not surprisingly, despite working for myself, I still did not like that I had to be somewhere during working hours.

Unfortunately, as a business with a physical premises, the English school demanded my presence every day unless I was willing to forgo any possible patronage that might walk in off the street. Ironically, despite my immaculate attendance, many days my English school was empty and I spent the time working online.

It didn’t take long for me to realize, despite my passion for the idea and my entrepreneurial spirit, my tutoring service was not going to work unless I made a significant commitment to it. I would need to either shut it down, or invest money and time and treat it like a true start-up.

At the time I had a growing Internet based business demanding my attention that was profitable (BetterEdit - an online proofreading service I sold in 2007). It wasn’t too hard to decide what to do next. I closed down Aussie Tutor, broke my lease and went back to working at home.

A Web Based Life

I am very thankful that I grew up during a period where the Internet also grew up. My very first casual job was web based (crafting websites for the business school at university) and my very first self created income stream came from the Internet too.

I can’t remember what life was like before the Internet, but I know it wasn’t nearly as good as it is now.

Tomorrow I hop on a plane and fly to Fiji. I’ll be there for 5 days before I board another plane where I’ll head to Hawaii. I’ll spend a week in the land of aloha, before jumping on another flight, this time to Vancouver, where a week of fun awaits. I’ll then make a short flight to Winnipeg, visit my grandmother, before settling in Toronto for 5 months. I intend to visit the USA for conferences and other fun things during my time in Canada too.

In Fiji I will be in a hotel but during the rest of my travels I’m staying in rented apartments with kitchens, private double beds and all the usual trimmings, at two thirds the price of equivalent standard hotels (I’m practicing a little 4-Hour Work Week accommodation hunting). I’ll have ample time and funds to do what I want and it’s all thanks to the World Wide Web. There’s not many occupations today that grant you this much freedom.

Ever present during this trip will be my laptop. My computer that connects me to the online world will serve as a communication tool to keep in touch with friends, family and colleagues. I’ll blog, create content, work on products, market, network and effectively live a very similar life to what I usually do at home in Brisbane.

The scenery might change, but the purpose and lifestyle doesn’t - and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Live the Stereotype - Laptop on the Beach

We all know the archetypical image of the entrepreneur sitting on the beach with their laptop, logging on to check how much money they made during the previous night and then settling back to a day full of sun, sand and sleep - a perpetual holiday.

I’ve already written about my disdain for the traditional non-working holiday, however the gist of the laptop on the beach image is definitely something I appreciate because it represents fantastic freedom. A business that can function - and even grow - despite your absence or location in the world, and the freedom to choose when to work, how to work and what to work on, is a great business.

This is a far cry from waking up at 8am to open the doors to a 3rd floor English tutoring school.

How To Build a Framework for Life Portability

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In 2007 I decided my blog was due for a new look, but it was not just about a cosmetic face-lift. I wanted to improve usability, clarity and most importantly, highlight a very important aspect of my business - the Blog Profits Blueprint/Blog Tips newsletter email opt-in.

Blog Designer: Mick Real

I’ve worked with a good designer friend now for over a year - Mick Real - who contributed to the look and feel for Blog Mastermind, the cover for the Blog Profits Blueprint and now, the complete redesign of Entrepreneurs-Journey.com.

Mick and I worked many months, putting together a layout, tweaking it and then implementing it over the top of the WordPress platform. There’s a lot to this new blog design and it was quite a monumental effort for both of us to get it right, but I’m pleased with the outcome and we have plans for enhancements in the future too. It’s great to have a designer who is enthusiastic about blogging and I have to pass on a big thanks to Mick, he’s been a devoted designer throughout the process.

The Importance of the Email List

I’ve already hinted many times in previous blog posts and email newsletters about what having an email list has done for my business. A blog is good, but for all but a few of the very top bloggers, most people will never enjoy significant conversion by marketing purely through blogging, they just never build a large enough following of readers.

Email marketing is more forgiving when you have fewer subscribers and is a very effective direct marketing communication tool. When an email list is combined with a blog as an entry point, it makes for a powerful one-two punch and the basis for an entire Internet business.

I don’t think every blog needs an email list, but I think every blog could benefit from one. Most bloggers struggle with one content commitment - writing regularly to a blog - so to include an email list as an additional outlet that requires content, can be difficult. I would argue that an email list requires a lot less “fresh” content than a blog and is more specific in topic, so can easily be set up and then let to operate effectively without constant attention (unlike a blog), but I digress, that’s a topic for another blog post.

Most bloggers are content to focus on generating income from advertising and don’t think beyond that, so an email list doesn’t factor into the model they are pursuing. I’m trying to change that - and at several points through Blog Mastermind I emphasize the power of email marketing - but for now I’ll probably sit as one of the few bloggers who leverage the blog and the list in a symbiotic relationship.

For me, I’m already convinced about email marketing, so I knew my new blog design had to highlight my email newsletter and better present the Blog Profits Blueprint as the incentive for joining. My last few blog + email list combined promotions have brought in at minimum $5,000, one breaking $10,000 and another closing in on $20,000. I could never have dreamed of doing this with just my blog. I know what a good email list can do and I want to continue to build on the great foundation I have laid so far.

The Opt-in Form

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These tips will make you a better human being in my opinion, but you have to stay on topic, so let’s focus on business.

Over the past few months I’ve experimented with some lifestyle changes. Not all of these changes were specifically about improving my business or working life, but they have enabled me to become more efficient at what I do during the day with my work. I suspect they will have a similar effect on you if you do them too.

Some of these tips, at least on the surface, might seem a bit dramatic to some people, others will laugh and say they have been doing these things for years. Either way, please read this advice with a mindset of how you could possibly implement them to help your life and your business.

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When I posted my September blog earnings of $10,899.83 a few readers replied asking for advice with affiliate marketing. Given nearly $4,400 of that income was from affiliate sales - the largest single source of income - it’s easy to understand why people want further explanation in this area.

I’ll be frank with you, the area I make money from affiliate sales, is a highly competitive one, and I would probably make about twice or thrice as much money if I was doing what I do in a different niche. Selling affiliate offers to people interested in making money online is one of the hardest markets to sell in because it is over saturated and people are very skeptical. Unless you are the Rich Jerk or John Reese, two guys with huge email lists of people who love to buy Internet marketing products, you will struggle in this industry.

If I didn’t enjoy the topics of blogging and Internet business (especially combined together) and I was more interested in affiliate marketing just for the sake of money, I’d enter other affiliate markets like dating or ring tones (although these are quite saturated too) or go hunting for under serviced niche markets, where Internet marketing techniques will work even better because people are not used to them. A search of the various products you find at affiliate networks like Commission Junction and AzoogleAds provide plenty of inspiration for industries to enter as an affiliate marketer, beyond selling make money online products.

Not surprisingly, the Internet marketing industry is one of the most mature when it comes to Internet marketing tactics and as a result, the customers are over exposed to all the techniques we love so much, such as - namesqueeze pages, email marketing, sales copy, testimonials, etc. That’s not to say there is no money to be made, but you really need to be on top of your game. Other industries will be more forgiving.

I’ve been tempted many a time to jump ship after experiencing conversion rates lower than 0.1% on promotions I’ve done for Internet marketing products, although that might be more to do with the type of person I attract rather than the market itself.

The lesson here is that if you plan to enter the affiliate marketing arena and focus on Internet marketing products expect serious competition, and you better know how to find people who buy, which is an art form in itself!

With that out of the way, let’s take a look at how you can use a blog make affiliate income.

It Starts With The First Sale

The first money I ever made from affiliate marketing came from my blog. The grand total - $13 - and that was a couple of days after posting the article I had spent two hours slaving over hoping to make some big cash.

At the time I had an audience of 500 readers a day, although that may have been over exaggerated because I was using Webalizer to track my numbers, which generally provides a higher total compared to other statistics packages (Google Analytics for example shows less than half the visitors that Webalizer does). I was told about 2% is a reasonable conversion rate from people who know these things, so I assumed that would mean I would get at least 10 sales based on 500 readers.

I was like - Wow! if I can get 10 sales of an affiliate product that pays me $13 per sale, then all I need to do is write a great blog article to make $130 bucks! Do that a few times a week and you have a pretty darn good income, was what I thought to myself.

Rather than put in a half-hearted effort I wanted to be genuine and recommend something I knew was good, which I had used myself, from someone I respected and wasn’t too expensive (I didn’t think my readers had a lot of money at the time). I wrote my blog post, talked about how good the product was, used a little bit of scarcity because I thought the product offer was due to finish at the end of the month (turns out it wasn’t), published the article and then went to bed.

You can see the article here (incidentally the offer is still active - so much for scarcity!) -

Limited Time Special Price On AdWords E-Book

I woke up the next day, powered up my computer, opened up my browser and email, and excitedly looked to see if I had made any sales during the night.

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