A serious post for a change that is not about female orgasms, gays, lesbians, or my mom making me up as a raging transvestite... haven't you seen the pics yet? You'd better go and look.... I'll wait for you.
Yes, I know, it's a bit 'Crying Game' isn't it... funny? yes, I know...
Serious business now.
I'm conducting an experiment. Some of you might know that I have my own business, I sell cars. I haven't really shouted about it on here, but I have a couple of websites that I have built and have their own merits, but are nothing that's going to set the technological world on fire. Well, they are doing the job well enough and that's all I need.
Because I'm in an industry that is very cut-throat and very over-populated, there's never a chance that I'm ever going to make the top ten in google unless I pay a shit load of money for google adwords. (Don't know what they are? Don't worry it's very boring and means that if I want someone to see my website in the top ten of google I have to pay about $30 for one visitor to my website who is just going to have a look at some nice pictures and not buy anything.) So stuff that.
So I've been looking into Search Engine Optimization recently. YAWN!!!!!! Techies are so bloody boring. I'm sorry, but they are. Shit, I've practically been falling asleep here reading some forums and shit, but I have learnt a little bit and tried applying it to my websites. My websites are not MySpace, or Mindsay, by any stretch of the imagination, but in terms of a car site, they are pretty big with 100 odd pages each, so it takes time to get them all updated.
Anyway. So looking at these forums, I have found that there are a lot of these internet marketers on there that claim to be making six and seven figure incomes from 'the comfort of your own home!' Yeah ok! Whatever!!!
But is there any truth in it? I mean, when you cut out all the crap and the marketing speech and the cleverly worded text, is there something in this for me?
Well, I'm about to find out.
All these 'get rich quick' schemes, I'm too long in the tooth for. Amway Shamway - I tried that when I was 20 and I spent a fortune and got relatively nothing in return, so after 2 years I gave it up as a bad job. Herbal supplements, home catalog shopping, weight loss pills, you name it, I've done it, heard of it and tried it and failed at it.
They don't work. Yes, they have great marketing people behind them and a killer system, and anyone that has the money and perseverance to complete it, then cool, good on them. The only thing I found was that I was looking down the barrel of a financial gun. I didn't much like the people either. They were turning into corporate machines that had forgotten the fun part of life and they just lived for 'the business'.
Fast forward to today.
I'm just me. We have a simple life and although I have my own business, take all the preconceived ideas out of your head and get this. I'm not rich. To have your own business means working 70+ hour weeks, having no money, putting your life, heart and soul into something that you have no idea is going to work, and taking little or no pay from the business because you have to re-invest the little money you have to pay bills, the tax man, running costs, internet connections and dealing with customers complaints and customers bitching you out while you smile sweetly at them.
It's no bloody picnic, I tell you. I've had my own business since the turn of the millennium, with a years break when the first one went belly up. Long story.
So. At last I get to it. I'm conducting an experiment.
I have $200 in a new bank account. I'm not going to spend any more than that. I'm not going to buy anything from an 'Internet Marketing Guru'. I'm going out with all the 'knowledge' I have gained over the last 15 years and more recently, few weeks in Internet university..(just me researching the internet) and I'm going to see if it possible to make a significant income using the power of the internet alone. The experiment is to find out if the common man with very little prior internet knowledge can too make a substantial amount of money from the internet.
I'm going to be documenting it too. I have yet another blog, but not here on Mindsay, I set it up on blogger.com (sorry Mindsay) because that will be my first income stream, as I am allowed to have my own adsense adverts by google on my blog and I make money from it. Sorry, but that's the nature of making money - you can't be emotional about this shit!
So if you would like to be there from the start and track my progress (I should sell this to the TV) then, by all means, you can have a look at my blog here:
http://thisiswhatmylifehascometo.blogspot.com The first post I made a few days ago is a little long, but maybe worth reading.
If you're interested, I'll see you there!
internet marketing search
