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Success stories

Discussion in 'General Business' started by jeffbeer, Dec 18, 2011.

  1. #1
    Day in, day out I read about the same questions (example, how to earn $5/day). But I just had an inspiration from a recent thread that made me want to start this thread; a focus on your successes!

    Just simply give a reply about your story on the venture/business/projects/sites/services, etc.
    No need to share earnings or personal matters, but if you are confortable doing so then go for it.
    I appreciate all of your contributions... Look forward to your stories :)
     
    jeffbeer, Dec 18, 2011 IP
  2. fathobbitsss

    fathobbitsss Greenhorn

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    #2
    1. got funded by a VC - success
    2. business model failed - fail
    3. changed focus to 100% seo, investors don't like it - fail
    4. ran out of funding, bootstrap by selling seo services - fail
    5. site traffic spikes by 1000 visitors a day - success
    6. traffic doesn't convert - fail

    more fails than successes, but such is life, keep hustling

    "i have not failed, i've just discovered 10,000 ways that don't work"
     
    fathobbitsss, Dec 18, 2011 IP
  3. jeffbeer

    jeffbeer Member

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    #3
    Thanks for sharing. It's refreshing to hear such brutal honesty. I think there are many others who share your story too.
     
    jeffbeer, Dec 22, 2011 IP
  4. ogurtsov alexey

    ogurtsov alexey Peon

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    #4
    My friendhas successfully implemented a project to create online database of corporate lunches (business lunch). He collected data on all the cafes that offer this service. And asked them to update the information daily. He received the income from each transaction. Income is small. That clients do not work directly with each other, by passing him.
     
    ogurtsov alexey, Dec 23, 2011 IP
  5. ogurtsov alexey

    ogurtsov alexey Peon

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    #5
    Sorry, I duplicated the message
     
    Last edited: Dec 23, 2011
    ogurtsov alexey, Dec 23, 2011 IP
  6. jeffbeer

    jeffbeer Member

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    #6
    Thats pretty unique, and others can correct me, but I never heard of such a service before. Regardless of profit, sounds like he made a good business idea!
     
    jeffbeer, Dec 23, 2011 IP
  7. savioder

    savioder Peon

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    #7
    I have earned 200,000 dollars or 1 crore rupees in the last 12 years through my online business. Started it off as a website for my classes but soon it got me visitors from all over the world and made me money through affiliate programs, online counseling services, adsense, selling our classroom courses, and more. Most of the money came from selling our classroom courses we offered in Mumbai. The money earned was enough to buy me a small flat for my family, a few foreign vacations, and enough savings so that I could take a break from the classes since April 2011.

    Now, I am desperately trying to enter into the music industry. I hope to earn the money needed to finance my music career by selling off the 1000+ domains I own. Will keep you guys posted on that in the near future.
     
    savioder, Dec 25, 2011 IP
  8. ttnorris

    ttnorris Peon

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    #8
    Wow, congratulations. I hope to be that blessed one day. I do actually work at home myself but I've gotten nowhere near that amount of money yet.
     
    ttnorris, Dec 25, 2011 IP
  9. PanosZ

    PanosZ Member

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    #9
    Fantastic.Hope your new business plan will bring you more and more.
     
    PanosZ, Dec 25, 2011 IP
  10. PressKean

    PressKean Member

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    #10
    Started my first site, failed miserably. Stopped for 6 months to learn more about internet marketing. Started my second site, was a blog on dogs and made about $80-120/month after 3 months of hard work. Sold the site to a friend's friend for 5x the revenue. I then started 6 micro niche blogs and made money with 5 of them. The other failed as I had no time to manage it in terms of keeping the contents updated. I consider them a success but not much were made. Probably about $50-60/site so it's a $250-300/month.

    After that, I've had dozens of sites running with VAs/writers etc and 80% were doing well, 20% either failed or discontinued. Still a great success for me. I'm now starting a gaming network and things are working well so far. To be honest, I had the most success with micro niches as they were pretty easy in my opinion. Ranking them were easy, click rates were pretty good as well. Some of the sites had low CPC so revenue wasn't much but most of my other fundings started from my micro niche blogs.

    As for my gaming network now, still not monetized as I'm not concerned on the revenue as of now. Fundings for this project came from 3 investors so I consider myself pretty lucky.
     
    PressKean, Dec 25, 2011 IP
  11. PC Mechanix

    PC Mechanix Greenhorn

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    #11
    Congrats! great story!
     
    PC Mechanix, Dec 25, 2011 IP
  12. airsidelimo123

    airsidelimo123 Peon

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    #12
    Success stories from successful people. Really great. These are things which leads for new comers in the business for successful life. Really notable things are mentioned here.
     
    airsidelimo123, Dec 26, 2011 IP
  13. jeffbeer

    jeffbeer Member

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    #13
    Thanks for the contributions everyone, great to hear honest stories.
    @savioder - I've always wanted to offer class/webinar services... just never panned out. Good luck with your music endeavor! I myself am a musician, so I'd be glad to help as best possible.
    @PressKean - Congrat, and a point that seems to be common with this thread is that profit is profit, regardless of the amount. Same is true for success. Good luck with your gaming network, sounds like a fun venture...but I know that will be challenging for you.
     
    jeffbeer, Dec 27, 2011 IP
  14. angelseo

    angelseo Peon

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    #14
    It was nice to read all your stories..I enjoyed the reading..
     
    angelseo, Dec 29, 2011 IP
  15. webdz

    webdz Peon

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    #15
    thanks a lot, that's inspiring
     
    webdz, Dec 29, 2011 IP
  16. Anurag_G

    Anurag_G Peon

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    #16
    Congratulation and thanks a lot for sharing.
     
    Anurag_G, Dec 29, 2011 IP
  17. mhovingh

    mhovingh Well-Known Member

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    #17
    Great idea for a thread. It is always good to hear how others have been successful online (from people who aren't trying to sell you an eBook or Training Videos when they are telling you how successful they are).

    I have been making money online around 7 years now. I fell into it when I saw an opportunity. I was big into gaming, a moderator and very active user on a popular gaming forum, and had just started playing games with a guy who did some freelance web programming. I had never made money online before, never tried, and had not ever considered it as an alternative to a 9-5.

    I started a site selling a couple gaming related software programs and within half a year was doing it full time, allowing me to quit my previous job delivering pizzas (miss the free pizza, glad to see everything else in the rear view). I got all my first customers, and received word of mouth referrals, completely through the gaming forum I was moderating. It was a good thing that I was in a position where I could get the word out as a moderator on a gaming forum because I had no idea what SEO was (didn't do a single backlink until into year 2) and didn't have any money to spend on ads.

    I contacted the developers of the software programs and just made a proposal to sell for them. I didn't create the programs or anything and didn't have any kind of special contact list. I just went to their websites to get their info and did some cold contacts.

    The bulk of the work with the business was customer service and managing the support forums. The web programmer friend helped me get the site set up and I started paying him when I made a profit, so I wasn't doing any coding or designing. The second full year in business, the site did a little over $125k in sales, 40% coming to me, which I payed myself and payed business expenses with. I wasn't making a huge amount of money, but it provided me with enough income to not have to hold another job.

    I kept paying my web programmer friend to implement my ideas and, by the end of the first year, was down to less than 2 hours per day of time I needed to spend working because of automating repetitive work and streamlining the customer service. I took my free time and spent it learning and teaching myself everything I could about Internet Marketing, SEO, and Online Business.

    Throughout my time working in the online world I have run the site I mentioned above, started a gaming forum (more for fun but did monetize it), done some work in niche sites and affiliate marketing, set up some websites for some local businesses, and now work part time as an online business & marketing consultant and work with developers who have the time to develop but have not been able to make something marketable on their own. The other part of my time I spend working on various projects and continuing to try and learn whatever I can about online business and marketing.

    I did not become rich overnight, use some secret method, or stick tons of money into getting started (paid for a shared hosting account, a domain name, and $250 to buy my first batch of software licenses to sell, all borrowed from a friend). I just saw an opportunity, planned it out, was fortunate to know a web programmer who would help me get started without charging me up front, and put in lots of hard work in the first few months while I was learning how to run a website and online business.
     
    mhovingh, Dec 30, 2011 IP
  18. jeffbeer

    jeffbeer Member

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    #18
    @mhovingh: I appreciate the thorough reply. Good motivation for the new year! I hope this inspires others to just try something this year. Suceed orr fail, I know I'm going for it with my ideas & projects :)
     
    jeffbeer, Jan 2, 2012 IP
  19. mhovingh

    mhovingh Well-Known Member

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    #19
    That is awesome and I truly wish you success this year! Attitude is one of the biggest hurdles. It is too easy to get down and let yourself get convinced that your time is wasted. Always be learning and gain confidence through your knowledge. Having the confidence from the knowledge helps a lot when you feel a lack of confidence in another area. Always be learning whenever you can, always be looking for ways to get more confidence in what you are doing! There is an immense amount of free information out there that you can use to build up your knowledge and that is a source of confidence that you don't have to put things on the line for. It is out there just waiting for you to take it and use it to put yourself in a better position.

    For me starting out, the confidence came from knowing that I knew a lot about the products I was selling. I also had taken a course in high school that was focused around Help Desk. I was confident that I knew how to bridge that gap between technical and layman's talk to provide my customers with the kind of support they needed to be happy buying from me, knowing that I was there with the answers when they ran into problems.

    Just as a bonus, only for those who read this thread (don't go sharing this with anyone or everyone will start doing it!), I use a special super secret method to focus and get great results from my work....

    And the secret is....

    I listen to 8-bit music a lot while I work. ;)
     
    mhovingh, Jan 2, 2012 IP
  20. mocil7

    mocil7 Peon

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    #20
    A fantastic story. This will be my inspiration to get started and be successful in online business.
     
    mocil7, Jan 3, 2012 IP