SEM Tycoon

**Elemak** · 12-14-2007, 04:53 PM

I'm not a BIG earner here, but I (1) haven't had a regular job in over a year, (2) am profitable enough to pay the bills and save a little extra, and (3) continually experience steady growth to my websites and my income.

I couldn't think of any questions to add off the top of my head that haven't already been asked, so what I thought I would do is just give my answers to all of the questions, in the hopes that it might help someone get as far as I have even if I can't afford to buy a new car every month yet =).

What makes your work so hard? I always get so much distractions. How do you keep yourself away from all types of distractions? It is a matter of prioritizing -- setting limits for yourself and respecting them. It is a huge help to have a dedicated space to be your "office", so that others know not to disturb you and so it is easy to get yourself in work mode because you are "at work". If you use the same space for work as you do for normal stuff in your house, you will find it very hard to keep work/play separate and you will either burnout because you feel like you are always working, or you will get nothing done because there are always too many distractions.

I tend to lose interest in a website about 3-4 months of working on it with no appriciable increase in traffic. How od you keep yourself motivated to work on something that takes so long to build? Although I continue working on websites long after they are "live", I would say that it has never taken me longer than 3-4 months to get a website up and running and get some basic traffic to it. I would get bored and frustrated too if after 3-4 months of work on a site it was still just sitting there. Sounds like you need to improve your techniques regarding traffic generation and link acquisition.

What is the best way to get started monetizing? What should I do first to get my feet off the ground? Adsense, without question, is by far the easiest way to start earning money online. With every other method of monetization I've come across, it requires time and energy from YOU to find the right affiliate programs, the right offers to promote, the right advertisers, etc etc. Adsense you can throw up in 5 minutes, optimize in terms of blending and placement in less than an hour, and spend the rest of your time developing the actual site itself and the content. Adsense is the #1 way to get you some money on the site while a site is under development -- once it is fully developed you can then increase your revenue by looking to replace or supplement adsense with more lucrative methods of monetization like affiliate offers.

What are the best ways to make money off message boards, where most people hardly ever look at the ads, let alone click them? Message boards are no different than any other site except that the traffic tends to be more repeat traffic, which means users are familiar with the site and used to the ads and will be more apt to ignore them. All it means is that you will have a more difficult time achieving a high CTR -- but the same techniques that work on a site with nonrecurring traffic work on a site with lots of recurring traffic like a forum. They may not work as well on a forum but they are the same techniques (in my opinion anyway).

Is there a way to make money from article sites?
With so many duplicated articles, would article sites survive? You can make money with anything if you are persistent enough. Article sites are definitely a VERY saturated market, so the key to making money here would be differentiating yourself from the competition. It would definitely be more difficult than a more innovate website idea, but it could work if you want it bad enough.

For relatively small, unactive forums, what do you reccomend to 'kick-start' them and get them going again? You need a base of at least a half dozen or a dozen people to post daily. This can be your friends or people you hire. Once you have what appears to be at least minimal regular posting on the forum, it's then just a matter of increasing traffic in order to increase members and increase posts.

Knowing what you know now, if you were to start all over where would you start? I would start by building a base of content sites because they are in my opinion the easiest sites to get going that require the least amount of custom-coded features.

How important is the domain name for a new site as in does it have to be a single word or 2 words? and can it have dashes or hyphens-between-words-etc? The domain name in my opinion is very important in the long term as it is the basis of your brand. The usual rules for domains apply: keywords are good, hyphens are usually bad, dot-com is usually best, and the shorter the better.

When writing a new site from scratch in a new niche, how do you drive traffic to it in the short term? The most effective way, if you already have a conglomeration of other sites to utilize, is to jumpstart its SERP potential through immediate backlinks from as many of your other sites as you can justify combined with onpage SEO on the new site. This will not produce IMMEDIATE results but it will make the difference as to what your traffic is like a few months down the road. For immediate results, you can do things like social bookmarking, and link/banner exchanges, although my preference is for strategies that work long term. Writing linkbait content is probably the absolute MOST effective way to produce results both short-term and long-term.

What was your biggest obstical to overcome? Laziness. The tendency to slow down or even stop working when I achieved moderate success. I had to teach myself to keep pushing even when I was succeeding. I also think it is very critical to review what you have done periodically and analyze what worked or didn't work about it, so you can alter your strategy, but this comes naturally for me so it wasn't an obstacle (but I think it's critical).

I have a low PPC budget but it would be nice to get this question answered: (rest omitted) This is a PPC arbitrage question, which is something I have little experience in. So I will pass on this question.

How do I capitalise on a niche, that is popular, but nonetheless a niche? LOL, well that's the big question isn't it? That is the question all of us are answering for ourselves each and every day -- and the question has a different answer for each niche. The only way I know for sure to find out the answer for your niche is trial and error.

What are your strategies in using keywords to optimize your blog for massive traffic(beside ppc)? I think building quality content is perhaps more important than keyword optimization, but keyword optimization (on-page SEO) definitely has its place. Mainly I make sure that the title of the page, the filename of the page, and the header (H1 tag) of the page all are keyword optimized. The content of the blog article itself (or any other content on any of my sites besides my two blogs) I don't worry about keywords so much as about making it a quality piece of content that people will learn from and want to link to. I think if you make quality content you will find that it is already very keyword optimized -- although you could spend time making it more so I think this would dillute from the readability and usability of the content for the end user and reduce the likelihood of getting links to it. I believe the content should be optimized for the user, not for search engines ... but everything OUTSIDE the content on the page I definitely make sure to optimize for SEO. Great question!

**Elemak** · 12-14-2007, 04:54 PM

What percentage of keyword density is considered safe to use? The answer to this is different for every search engine, and in fact it changes over time as well so that the correct answer for google today may not be the correct answer for google tomorrow. I think the best answer I can give you is that whatever looks natural is best... anything over 10% keyword density probably won't look natural, and the search engines try to optimize to what is natural for a page to look like and contain. If it looks natural, you probably won't have no long-term issues with search engines, but if it doesn't, you will.

What has been your biggest success in promotion/driving traffic to a new site? Tough question, because how do you define success? As in most traffic generated, most revenue generated, most enjoyable project? Or are you asking about which method of traffic generation have I found to be most successful? I think the best method of traffic generation is writing linkbait content. The most success I've had on an individual project? My games website has become very popular and the bulk of my revenue, and it's something I enjoy so I consider it my biggest success at the moment. But there wasn't any single defining traffic source that I achieved... so far every one of my sites gets traffic from many different sources. A little from search engines, a little from backlinks, a little from direct typeins or bookmarked pages, etc. I think the key to success is persistence rather than technique.

how did you start out? Believe it or not, I started out my hosting my server off my home DSL connection, using a dynamic DNS service to change the IP of my domains whenever my DSL dynamic IP renewed. The advantage to this is that I didn't have to pay for an internet connection or bandwidth for my new website business, because I already had the internet connection, and I didn't have to pay for a server because I used one of my own computers as a server. In other words, hosting was essentially free and the only upfront cost for starting my business was the $7 domain name. I now own close to 100 domains and about half that many websites, and I'm profitable enough that I don't have to work a regular job and spend all my work time making ME rich instead of my boss.

if you earn 50 grands per month when do you plan to buy ferrari? (if you already do not haev one) LOL =). I don't make QUITE that much (yet). I will leave that question to the true big earners =). I drive a Mustang at the moment and am very happy with it =).

If you could make one suggestion to a beginning webmaster, what would it be? Work on your business every day. Do SOMETHING, no matter how small, even if it is a day off. Persistence is key. If you are persistent and want success bad enough, you WILL achieve it. Also make sure you review what you did and the results it got so that you can finetune your strategy as you go along.

What is "the key" to your sucess? Desire.

Do you donate to charity? Not presently, but I have longterm plans to incorporate community service and pro bono work into what I do for the rest of my life. I'd like to start a business school one day and teach kids how to make money on their own, contrary to the crap we learn in school today about getting good grades, getting a nice job with a big company, and expecting them to take care of you when you're old and feeble. That is the myth of our parents and grandparents generation -- our education system is antiquated and still teaching the same old Industrial Age strategy that simply WILL NOT work in the Information Age.

Do you stick to any self imposed ethical guidelines or do you do whatever it takes to get traffic? I think we all have our morals, although some people's are more flexible than others. I don't think anyone here would hack someone else's site in order to get a backlink -- LOL =). In terms of "grayhat" or whatnot... well this is a controversial issue and different people draw the line in different places. But I think we all have our limits -- I think in general most people try to be good, moral people.

Which cpm company is best for small traffic websites...?? I think the answer to that depends on what kind of small traffic website it is. Different ad networks work better or worse for different kinds of sites.

How do you decide which websites to buy, and what time to sell? I don't buy and sell websites much, as I prefer to build them from the ground up and keep them forever, but I have done it in the past. When buying, I look for websites that have proven profitability and defensible multi-source traffic, so that I know the profit that it generates today will still be there in a month or a year. When selling, I usually am only willing to dump sites if I have reason to think their long-term profitability might be questionable. For example, I don't get into poker sites because of the recent ban on US-financial-institution transactions that caused so many US players to stop playing online. If I already had one or more poker websites when the ban occurred last year (I didn't), I probably would have looked into selling them at that time.

YPN, how do you get into their beta? I don't work for YPN and I couldn't begin to answer this question definitively, although my guess is that they have specific guidelines about the variety and number of websites they want in their beta program, and if you're having problems getting in it's because the website you're trying to get in with they already have plenty of in their program or they find it undesirable for some reason.

I recently purchased a high traffic site to turn into a membership site... How would you best monetize the traffic for this(any) site IF Adsense weren't an option now(poor keywords)? Affiliate offers in my opinion offer the best profitability for the least amount of integration effort, when adsense isn't an option.

**Elemak** · 12-14-2007, 04:54 PM

Your most successful site? www.playitontheweb.com

What percentage do you spend on advertising? Less than 5%. Almost all of my traffic is organic. This is one area where I feel I haven't maximized my potential and I am considering experimenting in paying for traffic, since I have a high enough CTR and eCPM now that I believe purchased traffic MIGHT pay for itself. I'm going to start experimenting.

What kind of ads do you place to get traffic? At the moment the only kind of online advertising I do is free -- organic SEO, link/banner exchanges, social bookmarking, directory/article submission, forum signature links, blog trackback links, etc etc. The few dollars I do spend on advertising presently goes to offline methods, such as tshirts and bumper stickers that I give out to my users.

On a more serious note I often wonder if it is better to spend my time making 1 or 2 sites and pushing thme to make alot of income or to setup 20 arcade like sites and try to make money from them? This is a VERY tough question. Different people have success with different things. I would say do both... quantity is definitely good and I have had success with that in the past, but I would also select one or two sites to spend time customizing to make them really stand out from the competition.

if you post on forums with sig links, how many forums per day usually do you post on and how many posts? Also what kind of time frame does this usually take? When I was really into doing this big time, I had about a dozen forums I would post on daily, and each forum I would try to make 10-20 posts on per day. When I was getting started this was a great, free way of getting a small amount of traffic, but nowadays I find that this is really too much work for so little traffic so I don't bother with it nearly as much. These days I post on forums to learn from other people and socialize more than I do for backlinks.

What's it like to wake up every day and be able to do exactly as you please? Short answer -- IT'S AWESOME!! I love it when it snows now because I live right by the interstate and I get to look out my window in the morning and see all the dayjobbers packed on the interstate, no doubt freezing as they desperately beg their heaters to warm up faster, and I laugh and laugh and laugh!!! LOL, sometimes I feel bad laughing at them, especially at my roommate who is one of them, but then I realize that I am where I am because of MY hard work and desire to get there, and I just feel amazed and blessed and saddened that other people haven't found the courage to do what is really not that much more difficult than working for someone else 40 hours a week. Then I push all these emotions out of my head and just go snuggle up back in my warm cozy bed for an hour or so before I decide to start my day =).

Do you envy people richer than you such as Bill Gates, the Yahoo or Google guys, Mark Cuban, etc. ? No, not really. I don't think money really changes a person, it just brings out who they really are, so I don't think any of the super-rich are all that different from you or I. I like that they have the power to change the world for the better and to live the lives they've always dreamed, but I plan to be there myself eventually so I don't really envy them.

What are you looking forward to in the future? Having only recently achieved financial independence, I'm looking forward to seeing my cashflow and net worth grow and being able to plan how to best use the money to help myself and help other people. I look forward to having a lot of fun developing the websites I have and new websites, and learning new technologies and new programming languages and techniques as they are released. I look forward with anxious trepidation to the future of humanity and hope that we can achieve some sanity in world politics and the path of our species -- I look forward hopefully to a Dr. Ron Paul white house and administration, God willing!

What worries you the most? Oh boy. I can't fit it all in here, but in short what worries me is inflation, hyperinflation, deflation, recession, depression, asset bubbles, malinvestment, easy credit, fiat currency, the Federal Reserve, our whole monetary system, Washington lobbyists and special interests, campaign finance, war, oil, political apathy, tyranny, abandonment of the US Constitution, the IRS, the education system, the Interstate Commerce Clause, the war on drugs, the war on terror, the war on civil liberties, the Military Commissions Act, the PATRIOT Act, warrantless domestic wiretapping, interventionist foreign policy, consumerism, instant gratification, the pharmaceutical cartel, the media cartel, the banking cartel, and bad parenting. But hey, we've gotten through worse! Heh.

Even Bill Gates can not help everyone in need. How do you justify in your mind giving or not giving to people in need? This is a very very good question, and I will just lay it out and be honest with you, even though some people may think I am selfish. I justify not giving to charity presently because I am only finally getting my own house in order, and I believe each person needs to take responsibility and take care of themself before they can take care of others. I _do_ feel an obligation to help my fellow man and believe I would derive great satisfaction from contributing positively to society, and thus I do have plans to do so longterm (I would like to start a business school for kids some day, for example), but I truly believe it is only moral for me to get my own house in order first.

My question is that you devoured information to help become more successful online, which leads me to...What do you recommend for learning? (EG what books, tools, etc to begin earning) To be perfectly honest, I learned the most from online forums like this one! I also learned through simple experimentation, and occasionally I'd run across a free ebook that would teach me a trick or two.

referring to niche websites, what would you class as profitable enough to enter. Say a market was open to be dominated, no 1 SERPs on all search engines easily achievable, how many searches and what value of payment per click for keywords would you consider worth the time to develop and optimize a site. I will leave this question to more experienced people.

**Mr. Websites** · 12-18-2007, 01:07 AM

I'm glad someone is actually making money within the gaming industry! :blush:
Congratulations; hopefully I will parallel your success in the near future.

**lifegauge** · 12-23-2007, 10:56 PM

Wow this is great sharing, thanks. I was thinking about "How do you decide which websites to buy, and what time to sell?". If it is a website with more than one bidder (other than yourself), it's probably worth a shot at since worst-case-scenario, if you can't monetize it as much as you wanted to, you could probably sell it off at the same price you bought it for, hence only losing your time spent?

**r2rprofits** · 01-14-2008, 04:25 PM

Great to know your income is increasing consistantly!

**onlineincome** · 02-01-2008, 11:45 PM

Just continue focusing on what you love doing that's giving you bread & butter & satisfaction as well. Not many is doing what they love. Whatever you focus on will expand. So keep at it