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How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

blog.cubeofm.com

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Re: How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

#91

Post by jacquesm »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #90
jacquesm wrote: post #79

Interesting, I've been doing just that for the last couple of years. It's been a mix of partial successes and total failures, mostly failures. I didn't want to go the 'mfa' route for obvious reasons, so I try to make these sites in to something that actually is useful, and that have a sense of community about them. Here is a breakdown of what you can make this way in a month based on adsense alone after several years…

I'd add something else. It's all so very easy to say that you can quickly make a buck a day on the internet. "Sure, just throw together some videos of puppies and put some adsense on there" but that's not the reality of the net today. People and companies are heavily competing on every freaking keyword that anybody might be interested in. That doesn't mean there isn't opportunities, but it's a much longer haul than j…

You're absolutely correct.

Note that in that list there are several sites that have millions of pageviews per month (a success by most standards), and in spite of that the monetization simply sucks.

If you were to spread those millions of pageviews across many smaller sites the maintenance headache would be a multiple of what it is right now and you'd still not make more than roughly $1000 / month.

If I lost all the $1 per day sites from the list (or lower) there would be only 5 sites left.

Re: How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

#92

Post by maxklein »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #90
jacquesm wrote: post #79

Interesting, I've been doing just that for the last couple of years. It's been a mix of partial successes and total failures, mostly failures. I didn't want to go the 'mfa' route for obvious reasons, so I try to make these sites in to something that actually is useful, and that have a sense of community about them. Here is a breakdown of what you can make this way in a month based on adsense alone after several years…

I'd add something else. It's all so very easy to say that you can quickly make a buck a day on the internet. "Sure, just throw together some videos of puppies and put some adsense on there" but that's not the reality of the net today. People and companies are heavily competing on every freaking keyword that anybody might be interested in. That doesn't mean there isn't opportunities, but it's a much longer haul than j…

Yes, if you're going to try to get into adsense or adwords at this point in time you are really behind the curve. The game has moved on - offer something people want. Use your hobby or pick something you can research and offer good info.

For example, I suddenly need to know a lot about tax because with my sudden increase in income I don't know what to do. I would easily pay $50 for a tax-for-dummies who make above $10k a month book. It's a small niche, but it is valuable.

Or healthcare. For sick people, this topic is very important. If there is something that offers me good value for this, I will pay for it.

I am asthmatic, for example. There are very few software out there to help asthmatics.

Don't do the adworse nonsense of years ago. Do tiny projects that help people or solve peoples problems and it will be easy to make your dollar.

Re: How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

#93

Post by zaidf »

maxklein wrote: post #92
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd add something else. It's all so very easy to say that you can quickly make a buck a day on the internet. "Sure, just throw together some videos of puppies and put some adsense on there" but that's not the reality of the net today. People and companies are heavily competing on every freaking keyword that anybody might be interested in. That doesn't mean there isn't opportunities, but it's a much longer haul than j…

Yes, if you're going to try to get into adsense or adwords at this point in time you are really behind the curve. The game has moved on - offer something people want. Use your hobby or pick something you can research and offer good info. For example, I suddenly need to know a lot about tax because with my sudden increase in income I don't know what to do. I would easily pay $50 for a tax-for-dummies who make above $1…

So how are you monetizing if not via adsense?

Re: How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

#94

Post by icey »

dbz wrote: post #20
icey wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other side of that is that if you don't have to work, you can work on anything you'd like.

It will take years to make 400 projects. Looks like a full time job to me. Allow me to explain.... You make a project today. 1 buck. Another project tomorrow. 2 bucks. Wait a minute. I can't like off of two bucks..... You will need another job to provide that needed income to live off of. Especially to pay bills. It will take years

If you make a throwaway app every 2 days, that's 400 apps in a little over 2 years. That's far less time than it takes to go to college and get a bachelor's degree. When you're done, you've got enough income to live off of, and you can work on anything you damned well please.

I don't know that I necessarily agree with Max's premise, but I don't think timing is that big an issue (assuming everything else works out).

Re: How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

#95

Post by maxklein »

jacquesm wrote: post #79

Interesting, I've been doing just that for the last couple of years. It's been a mix of partial successes and total failures, mostly failures. I didn't want to go the 'mfa' route for obvious reasons, so I try to make these sites in to something that actually is useful, and that have a sense of community about them. Here is a breakdown of what you can make this way in a month based on adsense alone after several years…

You misunderstand the optimisation principle. A project that makes $1 a day but is impossible to modify to make new projects is not a valid project. A project that requires an hour of maintainance everyday is not a valid project.

The point of my approach is TIME optimisation. For this, you have to automate - it is the first step of time optimisation. If you are not automating, or automation was not built into your plan before you started, you are doing it wrong.

What you have is the first iteration - my method would take all the ones above $1, then optimise the time spent maintaining it till it became minimal. If it were not possible to optimise it in that method, then someone external can be brought in, who maintains it for half the income, giving you absolute free time to make the next project.

I did not speak about bad performers yet - the projects who do not make the required $1. It's not possible to follow this system without hitting some duds. You spend a reasonable amount of time trying to bring it up, if it does not work, you have to get rid of it. You are optimising your time, so you cannot afford to do something that does not warrant the time spent on it.

Re: How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

#96

Post by jacquesm »

maxklein wrote: post #92
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd add something else. It's all so very easy to say that you can quickly make a buck a day on the internet. "Sure, just throw together some videos of puppies and put some adsense on there" but that's not the reality of the net today. People and companies are heavily competing on every freaking keyword that anybody might be interested in. That doesn't mean there isn't opportunities, but it's a much longer haul than j…

Yes, if you're going to try to get into adsense or adwords at this point in time you are really behind the curve. The game has moved on - offer something people want. Use your hobby or pick something you can research and offer good info. For example, I suddenly need to know a lot about tax because with my sudden increase in income I don't know what to do. I would easily pay $50 for a tax-for-dummies who make above $1…

There's a contradiction in there somewhere.

The reason I said maintenance is important is because the game is 'moving on' all the time. So, whatever you make today that will make you your $1/day will not continue to do so for a long time. You'll be in a new ratrace, but one of your own making. The one where you will have to replace old stuff with new stuff fast enough to make up for the churn.

The $50 tax-for-dummies book sounds like a great plan, but it would take a man-year or more to write that book before you'd pay $50 for it.

It had better not be a small niche then!

How could software help asthmatics ?

The 'adworse nonsense' is still the easiest way to monetize 'tiny' things.

Re: How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

#97

Post by mahmud »

conesus wrote: post #30

This is a sure-fire way to create a lot of spam and hack products. The creative element of fostering a project and putting real intellectual effort is gone, for sake of trying to turn a measly profit. There is nothing artistic or genuine about what he is doing here. There is no soul in these products. Of all the products and software I use, there is soul in every single one of them. Safari, Tweetie/Twitter, Hacker Ne…

How many of those proud products have you paid for? :-)

Re: How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

#98

Post by vijayr »

Interesting article.

I guess there is definitely some money to be made, if the site is useful ("tool" based). Some examples:

http://selfmademinds.com/200811/mini-site-case-study-update/

http://www.calendarsquick.com/printables/index.html (don't know how much this site makes, I'd assume more than $1 per day)

Re: How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

#99

Post by gridspy »

acon wrote: post #67

This sort of reminds me of the old pottery story, where they had one group making which was graded on how many pots they made and another one which was only graded on their best pot. Of course the group which was graded on quantity made better pots in the end. I really think that by iterating really quickly you will become good faster than if you try to make the perfect thing right away. So don't be paralyzed by tryi…

There is a lot of merit in setting a series of easily achievable targets, each one slightly harder than the last.

This is the way I get everything done.

Re: How to become rich even if nobody is following you on Twitter

#100

Post by conesus »

mahmud wrote: post #97
conesus wrote: post #30

This is a sure-fire way to create a lot of spam and hack products. The creative element of fostering a project and putting real intellectual effort is gone, for sake of trying to turn a measly profit. There is nothing artistic or genuine about what he is doing here. There is no soul in these products. Of all the products and software I use, there is soul in every single one of them. Safari, Tweetie/Twitter, Hacker Ne…

How many of those proud products have you paid for? :-)

I pay for software. TextMate isn't free. Neither is Fireworks. Safari comes free on Snow Leopard, which isn't free. I paid for NetNewsWire, Tweetie, etc. Of course I pay for software. So do many other people. The folks and companies behind these products make money off their labors of love.

Schlock like this "Videos of Owls littered in ads will net you cash" scheme is a hair away from spam, and is not in HN's best interest, other than to demonstrate that this is the route creative professionals should avoid.

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