Never Pay for Premium Web Hosting Again

When I first started thinking about writing this post I had so many titles in head that I wasn’t sure what the best thing to name it would be. I am still not sure that this is the best title, but it is the one I went with. Here are some of the other titles I was considering:

“Make Money Online Starting Your Own Hosting Company”

“Why Pay for Hosting When You Can get it for FREE”

“Starting Your Own Hosting Company Is Easier Than You Think”

“Become a Web-Hosting Reseller and Get Your Sites Hosted For FREE”

There were a bunch more, but I am sure you get the idea.

So is this about you starting your own web hosting business and getting 1000’s of clients? Absolutely not! I would not start a large hosting company myself, unless I was extremely “Server Savvy”, which I definitely am not. Starting your own full blown hosting company takes A LOT OF WORK and you have to offer some sort of 24/7 support (Yuk!). Way too much work for me… but if you have the skills and dedication, I have known people that have made a TON OF MONEY doing it. It’s just not for me.

What this post is about is something I have been doing for many years now and it has literally saved me thousands of dollars in hosting costs. What I am talking about is getting yourself a “Reseller Hosting” account and having your family, friends, and associates pay for it. Now doesn’t that sound cool? Well it is easier than you think.

For those of you that don’t know, let’s first talk about what a Hosting Reseller account is. Most hosting companies nowadays offer a few different levels of hosting services; Basic Hosting, Reseller Hosting, and Dedicated Servers. For details on Basic Hosting and Dedicated Servers (since that is not what I am discussing) you can read more about them on HostGator’s website. I am using HostGator as an example as they are one of my favorite hosting companies, but not the only one we use.

A Reseller Plan is more like having your own dedicated server, but on a smaller scale, as in reality you are just renting a section of a larger server. The cool thing about a Reseller Plan vs. a regular Hosting Plan is it comes with WHM (Web Host Manager) which is a control panel that allows you to easily create, edit, and delete individual hosting accounts with a few strokes of your keyboard. You can also set-up all sorts of customized packages for any domain you would like to host. You can even set-up “Email Only” accounts, which I have done for several friends. If you don’t already have a Reseller Account you will be amazed by all the cool things you can do with the WHM.

So you are saying to yourself, “All that’s cool, but how do I get it for FREE?”  Well it takes a little bit of work (as all good things do), but not too much at all. If you order a starter Reseller Plan (which is all you probably need) it will cost you $24.95 per month with no set-up fee if you go with a company like HostGator. You can find companies that might be a little cheaper, and many that are much more expensive, but as far as uptime and customer support, I have found HostGator to be my favorite. Once you have your reseller account setup, you will need to find someone to pay the 25 bucks each month.

There are many different ways you can do this, but here is what I do. I find 5 friends or associates that would like to start their own blog, or maybe would like to have their own personalized email account. Then I setup whatever they want up for them and charge them five to ten dollars a month. It literally only takes a few minutes to setup a blog or email account for someone, and those type of accounts take hardly any type of support whatsoever and don’t use too much of the server’s resources. If they want me to customize their blog and add a bunch of plug-ins… of course I would charge more for that. Plus, I usually charge them for the entire year in advance so I can just pay my account for the year and I don’t have to worry about billing anyone. It is very basic stuff.

We have several personal “Reseller Accounts” with a couple different hosting companies and (fortunately for us) don’t pay for any of them ourselves.

For those of you thinking, “Why would I need to host more than the one site I own”, you are probably not looking at the big picture. If you are hoping to start making a lot of money online (which I assume you are, since you are reading this blog), you will eventually need to expand your network and build other sites. I don’t want to go there with this post, as I just wanted to show you how to get your hosting paid for, but we will go over that in future posts. Let’s just say it is really convenient to be able add an account whenever you like and to have it paid for is icing on the cake!

Selling Information Products – Best Ways to Start (Part 2)

I am going to change the order of things in my series on, “Selling Information Products”. Part 2 was going to be on some simple ways to create your first information product, but I am going to save that one for the next section. Instead, I am going to write about the best way I know of to create and sell your first information product and why I think it is the best.

As many of you know I have been making money online (doing all sorts of things) for over 10 years now, and in that time I have purchased MANY books and courses on all sorts of different ways of marketing things online. I believe the most I have ever spent on a product was around $997 which I purchased at a JV Alert Seminar. I probably never would have spent that much money on one product, but the creator gave anyone who purchased it life-time access to all his products and any future products he creates, so it was definitely worth the money to me. Plus he let us pay in in 3 installments, which really closed the deal.

Besides that one, I believe the most I have ever spent was; I bought a few products in the $497 range, many in the $97 range, a lot more in the $47 range and I cannot tell you how many in the $29.95 and under range. Almost all of them were very good products, except a few which I should have asked for my money back, but didn’t.

So why am I telling you this? Because of all the products I have purchased online to help me in my making money online endeavors, the best thing I have ever bought (to this day) only cost me $7.00. SERIOUSLY… ONLY $7 BUCKS! I am sure a large percentage of you out there have heard of this before, because it is definitely not new. But for those of you that haven’t, you should pay attention, as it is still one of the best ways to get started making money online. The product I am talking about is called the “Seven Dollar Secrets”.

What the Seven Dollar Secrets is a short 33 page eBook teaching you how you can make a ton of money online selling inexpensive (ideally around $7.00), short (around 30 pages), content-packed eBooks. Not only can you make a lot of money, but you can also build a subscriber list (who actually spend money online) at viral speed. And I am sure you know that building a list is the key to making money online for the long term.

So let me give you a quick overview of what you will learn, and more importantly what added bonus you will receive that makes the product worth many, many times more than seven dollars.

• You will learn how simple and fast it is to create a content rich eBook
• Why $7.00 is the “Magic Price” to start building your Info-Product Empire
• How you can make much more than the original $7 you charge your customers
• How to quickly build an Army of Affiliates eager to promote your book
• Why your subscriber list of paying customers will build at viral speed
• ADDED BONUS – The actual script he uses that makes all this work. I personally would spend at least $100 to purchase just the script and it comes FREE as a bonus for buying the eBook.

Now is this going to make you rich fast like one of those MILLION DOLLAR PRODUCT LAUNCHES you hear about all the time? HECK NO! What this is going to do (if you apply it) is it is going to help you get started (hopefully fast) making money, and even more importantly help you build a list of people who spend money online which is the most important thing of all. Because once you have built yourself one of those huge lists like the big gurus have, then you might be able to have one of those million dollar launches, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Let’s first get you started making some money.

SPECIAL NOTE TO ALL YOU BLOGGERS OUT THERE: If you want to make money blogging you need to do more than just write posts and paste Adsense and Banner Ads on your blog. If you visit all the probloggers out there like; John Chow, David Risley, Shoemoney, Zac Johnson, etc… they all do more than just write posts. Many of them have other sites that they own which they promote on their blogs that bring them in a lot of money; many have their own products, as well as promote affiliate products in many of their posts. You too need to step out of your comfort zone if you really want to start making money online. I honestly believe that this will open your eyes to a whole new world of income for you, and it is cheaper than the price of a pizza! Click here to grab a copy for yourself.

Do You Ever Get Distracted While Blogging?

I love the Internet! Unfortunately I think I am addicted to it… I have so many blogs and websites bookmarked it is scary. I can’t tell you how many times a day I check out sites like CNN.com and ESPN.com to see what is going on in the world, check the stock market, or to stay up with my favorite sports scores. Also I am subscribed to so many RSS feeds, as well as my favorite webmaster newsletter lists that there is always a continuous flow of emails I could be viewing. Plus I read at least a couple dozen of my favorite Blogger’s daily posts, and if I get the time I usually try to leave at least one comment on each.

Well as a blogger, this can be VERY DISTRACTING! Seriously… it seems every time I start to write a new post, I start out typing away… words just seem to flow out effortlessly. Next thing I know, my mind starts to drift and I start thinking about something else like, “I wonder if John has replied to my email yet”, or “I wonder if the S&P 500 is still down for the day”. So, inevitably I leave my partially completed post and go check on whatever distracted me. Next thing I know an hour or two has passed and if there is still enough time to get back to my post, usually I have lost my train of thought and it takes quite a while to get my mind back to the subject at hand.

Eventually I finish the post, but if I wasn’t distracted, I could have completed it in a fraction of the time. When I complain to my wife about this she always tells me to just disconnect from the Internet, so I can stay focused. Unfortunately, I just can’t find the willpower to do it.

Today I am testing my solution to my lack of willpower, and I will let you know how it works at the end of this post. I have owned a laptop (this is my second one) for several years now and the only time I HAVE EVER USED IT is when I go on business trips or vacations. I don’t think I have ever pulled it out at home, except for when I first purchased it to make sure it worked.

Well today is the start of a new day as far as my laptop is concerned. My goal for the summer and hopefully beyond is get out of the house every day and see if I can write a post or two while I am out of the office. Today I am sitting by the pool in my favorite outdoor chair with my boys, and they are playing in the water with a couple of their school buddies. They are having a great time and I am totally focused on this post… it is Heaven!

My boys actually have a week and a half left of school, as they are in year-round, so next week I am going to try a couple other locations and see how they work out. On Monday I am going to try writing at the Library, which I think is going to work out great, and one day I am going to head down to the beach and see how that works. I am really excited about trying this new routine.

OK… the post is over and I never stopped typing because of distractions, except once to tie my youngest boy’s swimsuit, as it kept falling down. So far this new technique is working! Now I get to jump in the pool and play for a while myself and then I might try and crank out another post for another blog!

How about you guys? Any of you get distracted by the Internet or just working at home? Do you have any tips for our readers to keep them focused? Please leave your comments below.

Test Drive Blog Masters Club for Only $4.95

I am sure you guys have heard of David Risley… one of my favorite probloggers. At the beginning of the week he opened the doors to his new Blog Masters Club, which is designed for those of you out there that want to actually make money with your blog(s). He definitely knows what he is talking about, as he has consistently earned in the 6-figures for the last several years just blogging.

Well I just got an  email from David a few minutes ago letting me know that he is going to let new members test out his new club for only $4.95. He letting people try it out to get those of you sitting on the fence about joining… to see first hand what an incredible program he is offering.

I could go on and on about what the club has to offer, but you can watch his video and see for yourself.

Selling Information Products – Why People Buy Them

Selling information products is one of best ways to start making money online. It doesn’t really matter what niche you are in, as people are always looking for information about something. It doesn’t even matter if they can find the information for free by doing a little searching online. There are still people that will pay you for that same information, as long as it is all put together in a nice package for them to get fast access.

So the first question you should ask yourself is, “Why would people give you their hard-earned cash for your information product, when they can find the same information for free online?”

Well I am going to answer that question in this… “Part 1” of my series on “Selling Information Products”.

There are lots reasons why people buy information products, and knowing “Why” will hopefully motivate you to get started creating your own.

1. People are just Plain Lazy – Everyone is busier than ever nowadays and most people just don’t have the time or energy to spend hours on Google trying to find the information they need in bits and pieces.

2. Perceived Value of the Product – When people see a beautifully packaged product (which is usually just a well designed eCover) they assume that they are getting a high quality, thoroughly researched product. They figure it is better information than they can find online for free.

3. People Need Information Now – Most people that are searching for something online need the information right away. It makes sense that if they can get all the information they need from one source, and it is reasonably priced… why not buy it.

4. They Have Too Much Money – There are people out there that just have too much money and when they find something that they love or just want to know more about… they buy everything they can on the subject. I love those guys!

I could add several more reasons, but those are my top four. The point I want you to take from this is there are millions of people out there with credit cards in their pockets ready to spend money on information products on their favorite niche. Why not create one for them? It is probably a lot easier than you think.

In “Part 2” of the series I will let you know about some simple ways to create your first information product.

Making Your Blog More Than Just A Blog!

We have several blogs that we run; most of them are very typical blogs like this one… just basically a bunch of posts with ads sprinkled throughout the site. This site is probably similar in set-up to most of the blogs you see online nowadays. The cool thing is you can actually make your blog so much more (which we plan to do with this site as it evolves).

With the way blogging platforms are setup, they are basically content management systems (CMS). We use WordPress to run most of our sites, and with all the cool plug-ins and add-on scripts available online you can pretty much turn your blog into any type of site you like. And if you can’t find a plug-in to do what you need… you can always go to a site like Elance and hire someone to create it for you. With all this technology at your fingertips, the sky is the limit to where you can take your blog.

One of the sites dearest to my heart is MiraMesa.com. It took me about a year of negotiating and a LOT OF MONEY for me to obtain that domain from the previous owner.  I bought it because Mira Mesa is the town I grew up in and I know everything about it, so I just had to have it. It is one of the largest communities in San Diego with about 80 to 90 thousand residents and growing. It has a huge business sector as well. If you are familiar with Qualcomm, they started their business at the west end of Mira Mesa Blvd. and are still here today… just in a LOT MORE buildings!

When I first purchased the domain, I paid some programmers to build me an incredible website. It actually ended up being TOO INCREDIBLE, but I will save that for a future post. To make a long story short, the custom website I had created worked perfectly for several months, but it soon started getting all sorts of bugs and eventually I had to shut it down.

So I had to come up with a new platform to run my website. I actually checked out some CMS platforms like Drupal and Joomla, but I ended up going with WordPress, and I am so glad I did.

When I first switched MiraMesa.com over to WordPress I had no interesting plug-ins or scripts… I was just using some free template and no other features.

Since then we have added several cool functions to the site to make it more like a Community Portal, versus a basic blog. We have an awesome Events Calendar and Business Directory that people in the community tell us they love. We have also just added a Coupon Section which people have been bugging us for months. We are still working on its functionality, but it works for now. Also, our local advertising is really starting to pick-up, which we really love

So what is the point I am trying to make from this post? My point is you don’t have to limit your site to just writing posts. With today’s plug-ins and scripts you can turn your blog into anything you like. You can sell products and services directly from your site, you can create a membership site, you can do whatever… the skies the limit.

What can you add to your site to make it more “User Friendly”?

Does Your Blog Make Hardly Any Money?

Does your blog suck at making you any real amount of money? If you answered “Yes”, don’t be too discouraged as most blogs hardly make any money at all. But that doesn’t mean your blog never will… it just means you need to change the way you are currently doing things.

One of my favorite bloggers, David Risley has created a great video explaining why most bloggers have a hard time making money online. His video will show you how to take your current traffic and turn it into cash in your bank account.

What I found very interesting is that the real money in blogging actually comes from getting your visitors to leave your site. After you watch the video it will totally make sense to you.

Friendship Chain Award

We had an awesome weekend of hanging out with our friends and family to celebrate our Independence Day and it kept me off the computer for a couple of days (which my wife really liked).

When I finally got a chance to check my email, I received an interesting one from Deneil Merritt over at http://deneilmerritt.com giving us a Friendship Award and inviting us to join a the chain.

Now I am not too familiar with Friendship Chains, but supposedly they are a great way to get some backlinks to your site and build some friendships along the way… and we love both, so we are passing it along.

Here are the Blogging Friends I am Tagging

1. David Risley
2. Your Blog is Money
3. Extreme John
4. SEO Marketing & Promotion
5. Curious Little Person
6. Ahnternet
7. Business Accent
8. Serradinho
9. Asswass
10. Tycoon Blogger
11. Money Making Mommy
12. Arashka
13. Proson Cheng

When you blog about this chain, please be sure to copy and paste the content below to keep the chain alive…

— Begin Copy —

This is the easy way and the fastest way to :

1. Make your Authority Technorati explode.
2. Increase your Google Page Rank.
3. Get more traffic to your blog.
4. Makes more new friends.

Rules:

1. Start copy from “Begin Copy” until “End Copy” to your blog.
2. Put your own blog name and link.
3. Tag your friends as much as you can.

1. Picturing of Life 2. Juliana’s Site 3. Hazel-My Life, My Hope, My Future 4. Jeanne-The Callalily Space 5.My Family is my Life 6. The Simple Life of a Baghag 7. On A Wonderful Day Like Today 8. House Everything 9. The Creativity in Me 10. Travel and Photography 11. Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow 12. You Are My Sunshine 13. Song to Remember 14. Super Blog 15. Philiippine Tv Marathon 16. Simply Blue 17. Breaking the Boundaries 18. Top Five 19. A Simple Life 20. Simple Happy Life 21. A Great Pleasure 22. Glossa~licious 23. Times Goes By 24. Empty Streets 1027 25. Serradinho 26. Extreme John 27. Deneil Merritt 28. Making Money Online 29. Your site here Spread the Love!

— End Copy —

If you name is on my list above, please try and find some time to post about it and pass this award along to your friends so they can do the same. Also, try and visit the sites listed to see what others are blogging about. It is  a great way to make new friends and everyone can always stand to have a few more friends.

Note: I just threw this list together, so I apologize if I did not mention you

Declare Independence for Yourself!

With tomorrow being our country’s Independence Day, I thought I would write a quick post for those of you out there still working 40-plus hour a week jobs…

Are you tired of being told what to do each day by your boss? Well back in late 1700’s the colonists were sick and tired of being told what to do by Great Britain and having to pay the always increasing taxes. So they decided they wanted their independence and went to war to get it. Was it hard? Absolutely! Was it worth it? Absolutely!

As with your job, if you hate it, why not make a change? Will it take a lot of work? Absolutely! But will it be worth it to work for yourself? Absolutely!

Now I am not saying to go and quit your job tomorrow, as that would not be very smart at all. What I am saying is; why don’t you find some business that you can start in your spare time and start working toward your goal of eventually working for yourself fulltime?

It is definitely going to take a lot of work, as most great things do. But, if you stick with it and finally become successful enough to declare Your Own Independence, it will be well worth the hard work you had to put in.

We wish everyone a Happy Independence Day!

What Do You Guys Think of Flippa?

I am a HUGE fan of SitePoint.com. They are one of the top sites online for website designers and programmers, plus they have tons of information on most anything web related. I highly recommend that you check them out, if you haven’t already. I have been a member  since their early days and I actually wrote an article for them back in 2001 called, “Turn Your Parked Domains into Profit Machines“. Yes, I was ahead of my time

Well earlier this year, I read about Website Flipping and thought it sounded like a pretty easy way to make some money, so I gave it a shot. I ended up flipping about 8 sites in a couple months and it was pretty profitable.

I sold all my sites through SitePoint’s Marketplace under the Start-Up Sites category. It was great because it only cost $10 to auction off a site and that was it. If your site did not sell, you would have to pay another $10 to re-list it, but that wasn’t too bad.

Well I guess SitePoint has been pretty successful with their Marketplace so they decided to create a spin-off company called FLIPPA… just for buying and selling websites. They removed those two services from SitePoint and moved it all over to Flippa, so you cannot buy and sell domain anymore on SitePoint.

Now I have not tried them yet, as the pricing structure has changed quite a bit and with the small margins I made flipping start-up sites, I am not sure if it is worth it.

Instead of the $10 I was paying before, they now charge $19 to list a site. On top of that… they have a new 5%  “Success Fee” (capped at $498) which you have to pay if your site sells.

Now if I were selling sites that sold for several thousand dollars, those fees would not be as big of a deal, but for selling start-up sites, where you are lucky to get a few hundred dollars (if that), that really digs into your profits. Especially if you have to re-list them one or two times.

Now I am not here to say anything bad about Flippa, as I have not tried them yet. I would love to hear the opinions of those of you that have used their new service, or hear your thoughts on their new pricing structure.

Please leave your thoughts in the “Comments Section” below…

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