December 21st, 2007 — Traffic
Brent Wilson did it. I never have.
It takes a great deal of luck. In Brent’s case, Ford released official information and pictures on the new 2008 Bullitt Mustang, so he stayed up all night getting his Mustang site updated with pictures and news. It paid off: he ranked #1 in Yahoo! for Bullitt Mustang, and that earned him a cool $1.326.64 in a single day.
December 20th, 2007 — Amazon.com
I wonder how it does.
Important Messages
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December 20th, 2007 — Being Nice
There is very little difference between curiosity and addiction.
There are many levels of addiction.
There are all sorts of ways to be hooked between 0 and 1.
We try to make the distinction between curiosity and addiction, but there actually is no strong distinction. They’re only different levels of the same thing.
At some point, you’re going to have to say, I’m going to stop this here.
You are not going to outgrow it.
December 20th, 2007 — Spending Money
I thought to myself: “What would it take to save up one million dollars?”
I found the CNN Savings Calculator, and plugged in numbers until I saw something realistic for me.
First, I have roughly $19,000 in savings at the moment. Maybe a little more, a little less.
Second, let’s say I save some amount of money every month. That’s reasonable. Hopefully the amount isn’t extraordinarily huge.
Third, I’ll take the default Federal and State rates, because I don’t know what mine actually are. The defaults are 25% and 6%, respectively. No tax-deferred accounts (yet anyway). I took the default “Average annual gain”, which is 9%.
And the years I’ll save? Well, let’s say I want the million dollars in 10 years. Thus, the lone variable: how much I’ll save each month for 10 years. (Note: if you make this 40 years, the amount goes down drastically.)
Answer: $5,450/month
At that rate:
| Your current savings will grow to: | $1,003,024.74 |
Yes, it’s pretty high, but it’s not too mind-blowingly crazy. This summer, I interned with Google and earned $5,000/month. If my salary eventually is double that (after graduating from college and so forth), I just have to live on $4,550/month.
Yes, that’s an optimistic view. But at the same time, it might be a bit pessimistic, because I could start my own company and potentially earn even more than $10k/month. At 18 years old, I was grossing nearly $3,000/month for a short time (if I put the work into it). And trust me, I made a lot of stupid decisions back then.
What do you think?
Of course, once you have the million dollars, you have to know how to spend it. As they say, “Money is worthless if you don’t actually live.”
This post inspired by Erica.
December 19th, 2007 — Motivation
“Challenges are opportunities in disguise.”
Do you believe that?
Bruce Lee said to throw challenges out the window, and instead create opportunities. That is, don’t sit around waiting for them to happen. Create them yourself.
How will you challenge yourself today?
December 10th, 2007 — Spending Money
Great comment by Christine…
Although I didn’t appreciate it when I was younger, I now realize the tremendously positive influence my parents and especially my grandparents have had on my life and my finances. Heavily impacted by the Great Depression, my grandparents inculcated the following values into our bloodstreams at a very early age:
1) 30 year Fixed. Period. If you can’t buy the house with this structure, you can’t afford it. End Of Story.
2) Don’t go into debt for your living expenses. Live within your means.
3) Save at least 10% of your money every paycheck.
4) Have an emergency fund to provide you with at least a 6 month cushion.
5) Buy the best quality you can afford, take care of it and replace it only when it wears out.
Is this glamorous? No. Do I drive a 7 series leased BMW? No. Do I buy nice things? Absolutely; however, our 401-ks are fully funded, we have 6 months of expenses covered and a growing investment portfolio that will provide for our security later in life…at least until Hillary decides that it isn’t fair that I have so much and confiscates my wealth with her ravenous appetite for taxation and redistributes it to make things fairer for those who “deserve our help”.
via Herb Greenberg, who I just watched on CNBC.
December 9th, 2007 — Internet Marketing, Traffic
I know you’ve heard it said before. There’s one thing every website and business needs, and that thing is: traffic.
Every webmaster wants to know… “How do I get more traffic to my site?”
The important thing to remember is that traffic is not just “traffic.” It’s people. Traffic is useless if it’s just search engine robots. In the last 24 hours alone, I’ve had exactly 1,091 Yahoo! Slurp Spiders visit my Google Forum. That’s not the kind of traffic I’m trying to build.
I decided to take some time to create a comprehensive list of the 5 best sites to post ads for free. These free advertisements are a good (free) starting point to getting your website noticed in the competitive Internet landscape.
Every one of these sites has been personally tested by me.
Te 5 Free Ad Sites
Take a minute to announce your site to all of these free sites, and you’ll be well on your way to getting noticed online.
Bonus: Rejected Sites
I tried these sites and they did not live up to expectations. Some don’t allow links for free.
If you’d like to suggest another site to review, leave a comment below. Let me know which of these sites did and didn’t work for you!
December 8th, 2007 — Audio, Internet Marketing, Reflections
What is Web 2.0?
What’s going to be big in 2008?
The Revelation of FLF
SM + K + T + P * C = FL
Starting Market + Knowledge + Traffic + Products * Copywriting = Freedom Lifestyle.
Ray Edwards: Declare Your Freedom In 2008
December 8th, 2007 — Internet Marketing
Have you considered website flipping?
While home flipping is getting harder and harder, website flipping profits are increasing.
There’s a new book called “Flip That Site” which explains exactly how to do it.
Some advice: scour SitePoint for deals in the $200-$600 range. Build it until you can sell it for about $2,000.
Also, to make sure you’re not getting ripped off, use SEOpen, a Firefox add-on.
December 5th, 2007 — Internet Marketing
Picked these up for future use. Clearly, it’s for a site designed for Internet Marketing Newbies, or Internet Newbie Marketing. Want to partner to put this together?
Leave a comment.