18 Comments on I will be moving away from blogging in 2010

Mitch on Sat, 19th Dec 2009 3:43 pm


Wow, I’m going to miss reading your posts, because I love your style. Glad you’ll still be around, but I fully understand where you’re coming from. I don’t like being poor either, and I’m killing myself doing all these different things.

So, you do what you have to do, and as long as we hear from you time to time, it’ll be all good.
Mitch´s last blog ..WordPress 2.9 Upgrade; My Issues

John Dilbeck on Sat, 19th Dec 2009 4:31 pm


Good afternoon, Mitch.

I’m changing venues, not styles.

My SBI sites have RSS feeds and I’ll be posting to AYearFromNow.com in the appropriate places instead of here and JohnDilbeckAndFriends.com and other blogs I’ve experimented with over the years.

You’ll even be able to comment, if you want.

But, yes, it’s a different approach.

I enjoy your blog and I’ll continue following it. Even though we’ve never met, I consider you one of my friends and I’m not going to lose touch with you.

Act on your dream!

JD

Chris on Sat, 19th Dec 2009 10:36 pm


Hi John,
I understand most of what you say. But what kind of website are you headed back to?
Is it a catalog website that sells products, or more like a topic website that sells a product or maybe display ads? I hope its OK to ask.
I enjoy your comments. Please add my name to any mailing list of your work.
THANK YOU!

Davor Gasparevic on Sun, 20th Dec 2009 10:04 am


Well, you have to admit, money making, internet marketing, affiliate marketing, are all very very competitive niches, especially when new blogs come around almost every day. I’ve figured that out lately when I’ve realized how fantastic some blogs are compared to mine…

I’m not yet to abandon blogging, but even if I stay with it, I will rather use blogging to make simple dynamic affiliate sites with professional outsourced reviews, rather than posting something myself that has already been said
Davor Gasparevic @ Cheap internet marketing ebooks blog´s last blog ..0.01$ book… And I thought it was a joke!

Brian D. Hawkins on Sun, 20th Dec 2009 1:18 pm


I totally understand your decision John. I may not be too far behind you, I’ve been seriously thinking about shutting down most of my blogs too for similar reasons. You have to follow your heart and passion. Good luck my friend, I’m glad to hear you will still be around.
Brian D. Hawkins´s last blog ..Extreme Advertising By Reebok – Better Legs And A Better Butt With Every Step

Dennis Edell on Sun, 20th Dec 2009 7:51 pm


Umm wow John, I’m glad I saw that comment over at Mitches place.

What will you do with this blog, sell it?
Dennis Edell´s last blog ..UPDATED – Pick My New Domain Names With A chance To Win $10!

John Dilbeck on Mon, 21st Dec 2009 5:10 am


Good morning, Chris,

No, I’m not going to do a catalog website, but I do have a variety of products for sale on CafePress, so I’ll be talking about them a lot more on AYearFromNow.com.

I have a very successful site focused on drag racing history at GeorgiaDragRacing.com where we never talk about making money. We talk about drag racing. I earn more from Adsense on that site than I do all my other sites put together. People are interested in drag racing and therefore they click on things that catch their interest. It has a lot less traffic than this blog, but earns a lot more and takes much less of my time to maintain.

Before I was dropped by Amazon.com, we sold a lot of books and other products through that site, too.

My brother, who owns the site, has a degenerative neck condition and is in a lot of pain these days, so he can no longer go to the events and photograph them or even write about them. So, the book that he worked on for so long will not be written, but we can at least document part of the history of drag racing in and around Atlanta on the website.

I’m going to work with him to see if we can find other people we can bring on board to keep adding quality content to the site.

Maybe we’ll be able to bring the history of Georgia Drag Racing into the 21st Century, too.

My Act On Your Dream! site at AYearFromNow.com was also paid for by Amazon.com ads. I’m going to see if I can replace them with ShopZilla ads so the site pays for itself and makes a profit.

It was never intended to be a money-making site, but I’m going to change that next year.

MurphyGold.com will be my main focus. I get paid upfront for the work I commit to do and I like that model a lot better than doing a lot of work and hoping someone will click on an ad or buy something. Of course, what I do has to work and has to help the local business owners increase their business, so I’ll be focusing on helping them get more customers and make more sales, but I don’t get a percentage of what they do, just the annual fee.

I have a couple of ideas for other websites, but they’re going to have to wait a few months before I do anything with them.

It’s always okay to ask. I may not answer some questions that pertain to what I think are private information, but otherwise I’m an open book.

The best way to follow what I’ll be doing in the future is to subscribe to the RSS feed on AYearFromNow.com or subscribe to the newsletter I have there. Although the focus will be different, I’m still going to write about some of the things I have on this blog.

Stay in touch. Maybe we can learn from each other.

Act on your dream!

JD

John Dilbeck on Mon, 21st Dec 2009 5:30 am


Good morning, Davor.

Yes, those are competitive niches, but they are not moneymakers for most people, at least from my experience.

Plus, more and more people are parroting each other saying the same things, many of which don’t work, and nobody is buying from each other.

Those that are buying from each other are doing so in an almost incestuous manner. They are trying to sell to people who are interested in selling, but not buying.

To make any real money, we need to bring in people who are interested in buying, and they are generally not the ones who are interested in making money. They already have money and want to spend it to enjoy the things in which they are interested or to solve a problem they have and don’t like.

So, while I’m going to use paid advertising, Adsense, and affiliate programs to monetize my sites, they are not going to be about those topics, i.e., affiliate marketing, home business, money-making, etc. I’m going to build a profitable marketing business by not talking so much about marketing.

I have found that properly structured, hierarchical websites are much easier to navigate than blogs and traffic tends to increase over time, where blog traffic tends to drop off rather rapidly when I’m not actively writing on them.

For example, I’m getting twice as many daily visitors to AYearFromNow.com than I was a year ago and I’ve done practically nothing to that site over the last year other than to remove all the Amazon.com links.

I’m not saying that blogging doesn’t work, but I am saying that it doesn’t work for the great majority of people who try it — especially those who are talking about making money.

The people who really succeed online are not in the home business, money-making, etc., niches. They are in niches that are much less competitive where their visitors are very interested in the topic and spend money to enjoy their hobbies and other interests.

Spend some time looking at these case studies for an example of what I’m saying. (Forget for a moment that they are using SBI. Just look at the topics of their sites and the niches where they compete.)

I may keep one or two blogs active, maybe even this one, but, if so, they will be used to supplement what I’m doing on other sites. I still haven’t decided exactly how I’m going to structure some of the changes I will make.

Act on your dream!

JD

John Dilbeck on Mon, 21st Dec 2009 5:39 am


Good morning, Brian.

I should have included you when I mentioned Mitch and AussieSire. I really enjoy reading what you write. I hope we can stay in touch.

Exactly. We have to follow our passions and act on our dreams if we are going to create the life we want.

It’s not just my blogs that I’m going to shut down. I’m probably going to kill a half-dozen or more of my old websites, too.

Good luck to you, too, Brian.

Act on your dream!

JD

John Dilbeck on Mon, 21st Dec 2009 5:49 am


Good morning, Dennis.

(I almost didn’t see your comment. It was caught by Askimet as spam. I’m happy I skimmed the spam comments and saw it so I could approve it before deleting them.)

I’m not sure what I’m going to do with this blog, but I won’t sell it.

There are several reasons.

1. It’s too closely associated with me and I don’t want someone else taking it into a different direction.

2. It’s full of valuable links to lots of sites, including yours and those of other commenters, and I really don’t want to lose that value.

3. I like talking to my blogging friends and this blog is set up well for that, so I may continue to post here now and then just so I can talk to some of you.

But, the difference is that I won’t be focused on making this blog profitable. I’ll enjoy the social interaction, if I keep it going, but I’ll probably lock all the comments on posts that are more than a couple of weeks old.

Just because I don’t see this blog as ever becoming a money maker doesn’t mean that it has no value to me for other reasons.

On the other hand, I’m tired of the constant barrage of updates in WordPress. So, if it gets to the point where it’s too much of a hassle, I’ll probably just shut it down and redirect the domain name to a page on one of my other sites.

I don’t really know, yet.

Act on your dream!

JD

Sire on Mon, 21st Dec 2009 8:12 am


Hey John, you have to do what you have to do mate, and I completely understand where you’re coming from.

I’m lucky in that blogging isn’t necessary for me to survive, and that means that I don’t have to worry whether or not it produces an income. Because I don’t have that stress, to make money, hanging over my head frees up my blogging style. I write what I want, and as long as I continue to enjoy doing it, nothing else matters.

I hope that 2010 makes up for all the unhappiness of 2009 and that your income goes through the roof.
Sire´s last blog ..Of Gary Vaynerchuk And His Belief That You Can Cash In On Your Passion

John Dilbeck on Mon, 21st Dec 2009 9:33 am


Good morning, Sire.

You’re right about their being a difference between having to earn a living from a blog and doing it for the enjoyment.

My problem is that I do it for both reasons, but for now, at least, the enjoyment is going to have to take a backseat to increasing my income.

Thanks for your kind words and well wishes. I hope your income goes through the roof next year, too!

(One of my big goals in life – which I’m not even within sight of achieving – is to pay a million dollars in income tax every year after taking every legal deduction. Now, that’s what I would call through the roof!)

All the best,

JD

Sire on Mon, 21st Dec 2009 6:49 pm


Yeah, that would be good huh, especially after donating some million to charity. Man, you would have really hit it big.
Sire´s last blog ..Of Gary Vaynerchuk And His Belief That You Can Cash In On Your Passion

Joan Adams on Fri, 25th Dec 2009 7:57 pm


John, I am at this moment evaluating what worked for me last year, what didn’t, and where the money is coming from — as well as trying to increase it. There are so many options and so many things I want to do in 2010, but I am determined to focus on succeeding with just a few things.
Best wishes to you in whatever you do! You know I am a big fan of yours and have appreciated your super support and encouragement over the past couple of years!
Do keep us posted!
Have a super happy and successful new year!
Joan Adams´s last blog ..3 Ways to Enjoy Holiday 30’s

John Dilbeck on Sat, 26th Dec 2009 5:28 pm


Good afternoon, Joan,

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas!

You’re absolutely right about all the options and I think that’s one of the problems I’ve had over the last couple of years. I believe in testing things and seeing how they work and whether or not they are profitable.

That has led me to do lots of things that were absolutely worthless and took me away from the things that were working for me.

I won’t say that blogging was worthless, because I met a lot of great people in the process, but it did not generate the income I want and need.

I have to say the same is true for Squidoo this year. As you know, I have a slow dial-up Internet connection and it’s getting harder and harder to get Squidoo lenses to load. I’m finding that it takes an inordinate amount of time to edit a Squidoo lens, too.

And, I’ve been reminded that we have very little control – if any – over the resources we build at Squidoo and similar sites like HubPages.

When Squidoo decided to change all the groups to lenses, we had no choice whatsoever. I lost a lot of work that I’d put into managing a couple of groups and I’m still not happy about it.

I don’t mind working hard, but I want to see predictable results for the work I’m putting in and, for me, I get more “bang for the buck” in building static, hierarchical websites that I own and control.

So, I’m going back to updating and improving them and I’m already seeing some increase in revenue, but it’s too early to see if that is a real trend or just some seasonal or random fluke.

I’ve finally taken the time to connect my Google Analytics and Adsense accounts and I’m busily adding the appropriate code to all my sites. Already, I’m seeing the value because I can see how much specific pages on my sites are earning and that’s going to give me feedback that I can use to tweak those pages for even better results.

It will also help me determine which pages aren’t paying their way and which may need to be monetized in a different way.

I hope you know that I’m a big fan of yours, too, Joan. I’ve enjoyed “talking” with you and learning from you and the things you’re doing. I look forward to much more of that in the coming years.

Now that I’m not going to be distracted by so many things, I’ll be able to focus much more than I have for the last couple of years.

We still have some ways we can work together to help promote each other and I look forward to talking to you about it — and finally actually doing it!

And, I hope you have a very happy and prosperous 2010, too. I’m hoping it’s going to be a much better year for all of us than 2009 has been.

Act on your dream!

JD

Jason Roberts on Wed, 30th Dec 2009 10:32 am


Hi JD,

I know you are a big advocate of passive residual income. We have launched an incredibly profitable program that can pay recurring commissions for many years to come, promoting something special that clients love!

Swing Timing Alert — SwingTiming.com — uses advanced market timing systems based on proven mathematical algorithms combined with index and inverse Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs) to help serious stock market investors to make money in both bull & bear markets.

The membership site is for serious investors who want to preserve and grow their wealth regardless of what happens to the economy, the dollar or the stock market. These people have the money and are willing to pay for information to help them achieve their financial & retirement goals.

Our affiliate programs is designed to pay 60% recurring commissions and provide a stable passive income by paying $54.88 per member per month for as long as that member remains active.

Let us assume affiliates refer 100 members. The first month members pay $4.97 for a 30-day trial out of which affiliates get $2.15. After that they are billed at $99.97 per month, out of which Clickbank deducts $8.50 for their charges. That leaves $91.47 out of which affiliates receive 60% or $54.88 per member per month.

That means for just 100 active members, affiliates get $5488 each and every month in perpetuity. This amount is automatically credited to their Clickbank account. That is a $65,856 annual income forever and from just 100 active members.

This is just an example and obviously your actual results will vary depending on how many members you refer and how long they remain active.

Please take a look at SwingTiming.net for complete details.

Thank you. With best regards,

Jason Roberts
Affiliate Manager
SwingTiming.net

John Dilbeck on Thu, 7th Jan 2010 3:36 pm


Good afternoon, Jason.

You’re right. I am a huge fan of passive residual income.

However, I know basically nothing about market timing systems and have no faith that anything like that works reliably through all market conditions.

I’m not saying that your system works or doesn’t, just that I don’t believe in them.

Therefore, even an affiliate program that pays as well as yours does just isn’t right for me.

Maybe some of our readers will be interested and they can contact you about it.

Thanks for bringing it to my attention.

Act on your dream!

JD

JO on Sun, 21st Feb 2010 11:35 pm


SBI definately has it’s advantages when it comes to online marketing. There’s so little maintence to that service and it’s easy to establish a website. I couldn’t recommend it enough either.
JO´s last blog ..Ideas for How to Find a Niche Market Online