A recap from april09-Sep09
My goal is to create residual income and passive income streams through and being able to be financially independent by age 31. .
Websites Types
So obviously, I have been focusing on developing money making websites. I have close to 30 websites, all making various amount of money. Lots of my websites are Amazon-based websites, but at least 25% of them are Adsense-based. Over the last few months, I have purchases quite a few software to help us. And I have to say that they seem to be wise investment, as our income has constantly been increasing over the months. . Notes on my websites I want to point out that not all of my websites are making any money. Less than half of the websites are making steady income right now, as I haven't filled them all out with content yet nor have been working on promoting them yet. .
Revenue Growth
In June, I (we were) excited if I saw a 20$ day... In July, I saw my first 50$ day! My all time day high seemed to plateau between 20$-$50 in July and August, although the overall monthly revenue did increase. I also noticed a decrease in traffic but assumed that my sudden decrease in traffic in July and August were due to people vacationing and going away on holidays. I was probably right because as soon as September hit... it hit hard!! I suddenly saw a huge increase in traffic, therefore in increase in revenue. In September I saw my first 70$ day... Then my first 80$ day... Then my first 100$ day... Then my first 120$ day! In one month, I made $1810.94! So in the following table, you can see my strong increase in revenue in September, but also the overall increase in revenues over the months since May 2009.
Growth in revenue per month, May 2009-September 2009
| May | Jun | July | Aug | September |
| $369.16 | $589.28 | $818.12 | $839.07 | $1810.94 |
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Amazon vs Adsense
I am undecided as whether I prefer Amazon or Adsense. While most of my websites are Amazon-based ones, I find that Adsense do give me a more steady income. However, I do feel that Amazon has the potential of making more money when it hits. I seem to understand the Adsense spirit better. I have been able to optimize my websites in order to increase my click-through rate As for Amazon... I am still way under the average number of purchases vs number of clicks. I am unsure why, and have been following other people in the hope that I could get a hint at how they manage to increase the number of purchases. So far, it hasn't been that successful, my Amazon rate seems to be fairly random, I can be selling a huge number of products one day and none the next following days. .
Mini-Conclusion for September 2009
I realized, after writing this post that, hey, I am actually not doing too bad. Putting those numbers together is giving me a better sense of where I am going. And I like where I am going so far!! .
Short Term Goal
1) I need to put content on lots of my website, increase the content, or simply complete them! 30 is a large number, sometimes difficult to manage. I will admit it, I do spend a fair bit of time trying to make my content and website look good. On many forums, people say not to spend too much time on the look or even content, but I am finding difficult to spread "crap" content all over the web =) 2) I also need to work harder on bringing my website keywords to the top. Several of my websites are on page 1 for they keyword, but not in the top 5. I know, from previous experience that being #2 or #8 will change your traffic by about 90%! .
Long Term Goal
1) Create more websites!! 2)I am aiming to be making a steady 2000$/month by Christmas!
| Jun | July | Aug | September |
| 589.28 | 818.12 | 839.07 | 1810.94 |
It’s been a while…
Okay it's been a while since I posted... A lot has happened since them... For personal reasons I had to change the domain on which I used to host this blog. And I've added Hatch to the blog, since we are pursuing this freedom 31 together. I guess I will remain the main writer for the blog for now, unless Hatch decides to add his own section or comments =)
Over the next few posts, I will do a big recap of what I (we) have been working on over the last few months and how the websites (I have many many of them right now!) have been doing. Your comments and advices are welcome, as always!
p.s. Hatch wanted me to give him credit for inspiring me to create this blog
April 26th update
Lots have happened since my last update April 12th.
First, I went ahead and decided to make the next big move... Investing in real estate :D Okay I did have a little bit of help with that one. My father, who has a lot of experience in real estate, talked me into investing into that nice small apartment building. With the low mortgage interest rates, I had the perfect combination, so I decided to just do it.
The apartment building consists of three main units and also has a bachelor in the basement, that can also be rented out.
The reason I decided to invest in the triplex is that, other than the down payment, there isn't any real cost associated with the building. The renting out of the three units+bachelor covers the mortgage and will even give me a bit of surplus by the end of the year. This way, I feel my money was put in a very safe investment, that will give me a big return on the long run.
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Second, my websites. I learned a lot throughout those two weeks as well in terms of websites, niche, adsense and affiliate sales.
My niches were: Niche 1 (ct), Niche 2 (ca), Niche 3(h), Niche 4(o)
My goals were:
* have Niche 1 on the first page of Google for the chosen set of keywords
--> Niche 1(ct) is on the first page of Google for the chosen set of keywords, after a lot (and a lot and a lot) of SEOing... HOWEVER, I realized that Niche 1(ct) wasn't gonna make any money. I realized that this first niche was chosen poorly, and although it has the potential of attracting people, it doesn't have quite the potential to making any money, as the click-through-rate is extremely low (below 1%). So I decided to let that website dies on its on, which I found a little bit frustrating since, as my first website, I had put so much dedication and effort into it. I least, I can learn from my mistakes.
* have Niche 2(ca) on the first 3 pages of Google for the chosen set of keywords
-->Niche 2(ca) is also doing well. It is now on the 2nd page of Google for my chosen set of keywords. Niche 2(ca) has pleasantly surprised me, as it is generating the most money and growing in the most steady way. The click through rate is fairly high, being between 5% to 20%. I can't wait to see Niche 2(ca) being on the first page of Google, now that I see its potential!
* have Niche 3(h) on the first page of Google for the chosen set of keywords
--> Niche 3 is doing fairly well and is on the first page of Google for the chosen set of keywords. It is on the fourth position of Google, although it seems to be stuck there. I have been doing a lot of SEO, and am hoping that it will catch up and climb up the page. Niche 3(h) is returning an okay click through rate, I am still positive of its potential of making money once its up the ladder.
* Start doing some SEO work for Niche 4
* Write some content for Niche 4
-->I neglected Niche 4(o). I did write a little bit of content and did a little bit of SEO work for it, but I certainly did not push it very hard. After being stuck on page 30, then 15 of Google for the longest time, it showed today on page 6 of Google, which I think isn't too bad, for a website that was neglected.
* be making about 5$/day
--> Unfortunately, I haven't reached my 5$/day goal yet. Nevertheless, I have been averaging 3.30$/day and have even had a 6$ and 8$ days in a row. My big mistake was too put so much effort in Niche1(ct) at the start, therefore neglecting the money-makers. But I am still learning, and hopefully I can catch up quickly.
* start a new blog with a new Niche with a good set of keywords
-->And I did! I started a completely new website, with a new niche (Niche 5(cr)) and a new set of keywords. This time, I decided to make things slightly different. I did not put any Adsense and decided instead to sign up for an Amazon affiliate sales. The set of keywords I chose had so few competition and so well targeted that after 3 days I setted up the website with the affiliate products from Amazon on it, it was on the first page of Google in 4th position! Although it is in 4th position, I haven't seen any sales yet. I'm hoping that as it goes up the page, I will start seeing some sales soon.
Some graphs
Niche 2 (ca) week by week: shows a steady increase over the weeks (the average of visits per day over last week is 40).
Niche 3(h) day by day:shows a steady increase over the days (the average of visits per day over last week is 25)
Niche 4(o) day by day:is taking some time to pick up, because I neglected it (the average of visits per day is lower than 10)
How I will create residual income
So I am really serious about creating residual income. The books I've read gave me ideas on how to start. At this point, I decided to focus on three ways to create residual income and passive income streams:
1--> Work on my investment and savings portfolio
2--> Develop a money making blog (not this one... not so far :P)
3--> Investing in real estate
So what do I need to know? Well I guess I need to learn about all of that...