Let me introduce myself and tell my success story. I am Sphomore because I meant to type in Sophomore and it was too late when I noticed I typed it wrong. Sophomore means "wise fool" (consider "sophisticated moron"). I picked that nickname because I feel I have no idea what I'm doing. I never took any web development classes. I don't know how to program except in QuickBasic, so that's what I use to write my HTML code. At the end of March I got paid over $1600 for February, and my finalized March earnings are over $2300. Remember, that climb isn't as steep as it looks because February was a short month. It was April 2010 I stopped expecting a certain lump sum from something else, and it is just as well. I started getting serious about one good website, serious because I had to do something to avoid losing our mobile home. I kept getting further behind on the bills. My AdSense income has been doubling every three or four months. Now, let me express gratitude that there is this forum. Here, I can talk about my success story. I cannot exactly mention numbers to by brother-in-law or the neighbours, if you know what I mean. It just isn't done. I have mentioned vaguely to a buddy at work that I might be able to quit my factory job by October. That was probably saying too much. I also probably said too much by telling people about my successful website. Now I have to worry that they'll click my ads and get me banned. Resist that temptation. If I quit my job, obviously I'll have to tell my wife about my AdSense earnings. Maybe I can wait until we get our tax return prepared. She will be so disappointed that we won't be getting money from I.R.S. until I show her my five-figures monthly payments which mean she can quit her job. Meanwhile, I am in suspense. How long will my AdSense income continue to climb, doubling every three or four months? Just before payday this month, there will be about five grand at risk of being swiped away by Google in one of those stories about disabled accounts. I am both excited and scared. I'm still behind on the bills. On 1 September 2010 a lady from the electric company knocked on my door, and they were about to shut off our power (which wouldn't be good, because my elderly mother-in-law stays here and my wife's side of the family would know.) unless I could pay the overdue amount by cheque or credit card. My first credit card didn't work, but I had one that did. Whew! Of course, now I'm catching up. The important thing is not to count on the AdSense money because of the disabled account stories. Besides the suspense, it's the waiting. I have to wait for my March earnings, and if my earnings do double every four months, three doublings make it 8 times as much, but I have to wait a year to see how much and collect it. I'm using a laptop I bought in 2004, now on its third hard drive. Soon I will afford a new computer and after a while, maybe an office where I can set up multiple computers. Find something you dig, and write about it.
Hang on, you can hardly pay the bills and you want to buy a new computer for yourself, a new office with several computers. jeez.
You should really keep your mouth shut about your website or adsense. If asked just say you work on the internet, not more. If asked to explain say you sell stuff online for other people and get a commission, you're an online salesman, sort of. That will keep the curious happy. Also good luck with the traffic, enjoy it while it lasts. And consider adding another source of revenu which can be added to adsense on your page, like kontera/infolinks. Monetize your traffic to the max because it can be gone tomorrow, that's my philosophy about it and as months pass by, it's all bonus, not expected at all.
I live in a mobile home with a 7 year old computer, my wife and my mother in law and I can't afford to pay any of my bills, despite working fulltime at a factory and earning $1000s a month from adsense. Wherever he lives, either mobile homes are very expensive or factory jobs don't pay much, because if I got $2000 a month from Adsense that'd be more than enough for all 5 of us (no mother in law) to live in our immobile home.
Good thing you do not count on AdSense as main income source. I would have been toasted if I relied mainly on AdSense.
if everything you said is true then you are lucky because i am in same situations i tried lot and work 24*7 but i am not able to earn a necessary earning for me. i also work in 10 yrs old pc whose condition is like a 100yr old person that soon going to die but we dont have anything other option to make it fine or buy new. congrats take care
if u haave enough traffic then u will become a premium publisher of adsense & then there will no fear of being banned !
Well, there's the park fee, the mortgage, the wife and two children. My AdSense money was a lot less before, and due to the disabled accounts risk, I can afford to plow back part of my profit in the hope of making more with a newer, faster machine, or an office and a bunch of machines, but I cannot risk taking out a loan for business expansion. In a way, it's like Major League Baseball players. Your career could end at any time, just lose your touch and you get cut, so you need to save it all up during your good years.
Your signature mentions Dominican Republic, so maybe you can explain this. How do the internet cafes survive in the Dominican Republic? There's like 10 computer stations at 20 pesos an hour, so even if they keep all ten in use, that's 200 pesos per hour, like $5.50 USD to pay for the staff, the rent, the utilities and the internet connection and to pay for the computers. How do they do it?