For the next few weeks, we will be looking at various types of sites that you can create to make money online.  I will include in detail how to go about creating these types of sites, costs involved and any other special information that may help you to succeed.

My reasoning for doing this is that when I started online, I really had no idea where to start.  It seems that everyone bombards you with their opportunity but doesn’t tell you the whole truth – and that is where most people either get ripped off, or lost.

So, I will try to lay things out, leave no stone unturned, and lay out a blueprint for you.  If I do miss something along the way, feel free to leave a comment and let me know – I am not perfect 😉

We’ll start things off tomorrow and take …

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If you have any niche (topic centered) websites, chances are that you have done some niche research.  Usually in these instances, you are looking for topics that have good monetization abilities and low competition.  I know that I have done research this way myself, and for the most part it works really well.

But, I would say that this method isn’t the easiest way.  Most gurus and other online experts tell you that this is the way to go, but let me share with you a method that I have been using to dominate the niches I want, even on terms with a lot of competition.

Chances are that you have been told that the dot com version …

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There are a lot of obvious differences between a business owner and an employee.  Some of the more common ones would be a paycheck, making $XX per hour, and being able to put in your time and leave the company you work for out of your mind when you go home.

But when it comes to being a business owner, one of the defining characteristics would be a different point of view on things.  Perhaps one of the most distinguishing differences would be the vocabulary of an entrepreneur compared to an employee.

For example, an employee would say I earn (or make) $XX per hour.  Their earnings are based on time and they earn money based on their time investment.

But for entrepreneurs, we …

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One of the biggest challenges that new business owners face is to curb their expectations of an instant windfall.  Many of these owners will give up on their business prematurely since they figure that it just won’t work and therefore they quit.

A good example of this phenomenon would be the dot com craze of the late nineties.  It was much like the goldrush of many years ago, and many people looked to the Internet to make a quick buck.  But when the dust cleared, many didn’t make their fortune and turned their backs on the Internet since “No one can make money online” – which was clearly an overreacion.

But how can you succeed at your business online or offline?

The …

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For those of you out there that are familiar with the Star Wars saga, this line might be familiar to you.  It was something that Yoda said to Luke Skywalker while training him to use the force and for me, it was the most important thing said in all of the movies.

Want to know why?

Well, it is a great piece of wisdom when it comes to business.  You will find that those who “do” succeed, and those who “do not” don’t  (that should be obvious).

But what really gets me is that when you “try” to do something, you rarely succeed anyway.  Sure, you …

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One of the big things that you should be focusing on with respect to your business is customer service.  In fact, your dealings with your customers are the lifeblood of your business, and if you neglect your customers, you will quickly see that your business doesn’t exist anymore.

Now, I am not going to make some sort of lecture about what your should do with respect to your customer service needs.  That is not what I want to talk about right now – instead of complaining about customer service, I actually want to praise one company that impressed me this week.

Yesterday, I received a phone call from GoDaddy.com.  Now, they are a domain registration company (if you are not familiar with them) and they are the first place that I had ever registered domains.  I was a little defensive at first since they had never called …

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One of the things that I try and teach the people that I work with (and share with you reading this blog) is that a mistake is good – as long as you learn from it.  If you don’t take something away from the incident, then you will continue to do the same thing over and over – if you do that in business, chances are you will fail.

But once in awhile, I get caught up in things and fail to follow my own advice.  This is something that affected me just this week, and the price of my choice is still being paid right at this moment.

You see, I decided that I could save myself some money and increase my profits if I changed hosting providers to one that was a little cheaper.  Sure, I don’t spend as much as some of you out there, but I was spending …

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I know that there is a lot of talk about diversification when it comes to investing in stocks or mutual funds.  But when it comes to business (specifically online business), it seems that this subject is quite often overlooked.

There are many people that will tell you that the way to succeed online is to create a site, optimize it, and market it and the money will come.  Now, I suppose there is a possibility that it could happen that way (take for example Facebook.com as an example), but chances are that it won’t.

Unfortunately, it can sometimes be hit or miss when it comes to the success (and revenue) that a website will generate and that is why you don’t want to have to depend on just one for your online success.  Take Google for example: they just don’t depend on their search engine for revenue – …

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I know that I have talked about Squidoo.com quite a bit on this blog over the past few months.  There is a good reason that I am talking about it, and I would like to share it with you today.

You see, the biggest challenge for most of us who are building websites is that we just don’t know if a certain idea will work or not until we try it.  I suppose that this is something that is true no matter what your business is, but it would be nice to test out a market before we made any investment of capital into it, right?

Well, Squidoo lets you do just that: you can pick pretty much any topic, setup a page in about half an hour, add it to some groups, market a little bit, and then sit and wait to see what happens.

If …

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Well, today celebrates my one year anniversary of quitting my job.  A year ago I was teetering on the brink of a big decision – put my faith in business and my ability to make it succeed, or stay at my job and be like everyone else.

At the time, I was very unhappy with my job and I went to work each day only to come home angry.  I felt that there was just something wrong getting paid by the hour and coming home with next to nothing.  Add that to the fact that I was missing out on my children’s lives – it was just a price I was not willing to pay.

So, I quit and put my faith in the business.

Now, a year later, I can say that I have made the right choice.  Though we are not rich (yet), we haven’t …

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