Introductions Thread

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Welcome onboard, but to clarify - I didn't create this forum, I am not the owner of the forum, and I gain NO DIRECT financial benefits from this forum. Apparently as I continue to repeat this over and over people seem to believe it less and less. But I cannot not agree with the evaluation of me.

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Wanted to say hello and thank you. I've been creeping around here for a minute already.
I'm going to try to comment relevantly if I can be helpful.
Hope to learn more and get to where I wanna go.
 
Terrestrial said:
get to where I wanna go
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And where is that? Tell us more about yourself. What kind of business are you interested in? What's your background experience? What are your skills and weaknesses? Where can we help you the most?
 
Hi guys,

I wanted to introduce myself to everyone here. This looks like a fantastic community and I am excited to be a part of it.

I'm a 28 year old guy, originally from the UK but now living in New York City.

I started working in sales when I was 16, part time after school and at the weekends. Where I'm from, outbound sales call centers are a huge industry, and they are always looking for staff. I was pretty good at it, so I continued doing it all the way through high school, and I used this type of work to pay my way through university in London.

After I graduated I got a job in the marketing department of a publishing company. I absolutely hated it and I didn't last long, and I ended up working in the promotions department of a London nightclub. That was where I discovered my love of creative advertising. Since then, I've worked as a copywriter in some of the biggest advertising agencies in the world.

While I mostly had permanent staff positions, there was a period of time where I was working freelance and pickings were slim. I ended up supplementing my income by writing content for internet marketers on WickedFire (RIP) and elsewhere. I was pretty curious about what my clients were doing, and gained some understanding, but ultimately I was just looking for a short term cash injection.

I was offered another agency staff copywriter position, this time in NYC, and hung up my content writing hat. For the last 18 months I've been living the big agency life, happily working on glamorous stuff huge national TV ad campaigns, etc. etc.

That brings me to the last few months. I've come to the very strong conclusion that I need to work for myself if I ever want to build wealth and have real freedom. I'm sick of working towards someone else's goals. I'm sure a lot of people here can relate. I'm lucky enough to have a pretty exciting and comfortably paid job, but I have a real hunger to build something for myself. I thought back to my content writing days and realized that IM could be an excellent path for me to follow. Although I'll have to pick up a lot of new skills, I have plenty of skills that can be transferred. In particular I'm interested in applying big agency creative strategy to IM, but of course I need to walk before I can run.

Right now I am just starting. In the short term I'm looking to dip my toe into affiliate marketing. I'm currently investigating traffic sources and offers, trying to find a way to get into profit quickly while still gathering data that will be useful to me when I have the budget to get into more difficult, but more profitable traffic sources. In the longer term, I have an idea for a "big brand" authority site. And in the immediate term I'm getting back into writing content, to build a war chest for the aforementioned.

As I said at the beginning, I'm really excited about being part of this community. I'll contribute where I can, and soak up some of the valuable information that so many people have generously provided.

All the best,

James
 
I think this might be where Generals are forged.

Not new to all the ticky-tacky tips and tricks. I've been seeing the evolution of things for awhile. I frequent IM, SEO and marketing blogs and forums. I like to stay on top of what the current trends are and also because I quite enjoy it. However, I must admit that I am very low tech. Most of the people in this forum could blow me away with their coding and technical skills. I am the Ford Aspire of the Internet marketing world technically. That's cool though, I am learning a little coding through free courses.
What I possess is a marketing mind. I can see angles that others don't, I can freestyle in that realm. I flow there and it comes so natural that I cannot turn it off.
I am not new to making money online. I've made a bit here and there. I've banged my head and wanted to take a bat to my computer because I wasn't able to impose my vision of what I wanted.

All that bull said, I have a goal. I have one niche or sub niche that I want to focus on. That is it. I have shelved everything else and want to dominate this one thing. The technical side of things are very daunting to me at this point,but I have decided that I will start small and ugly. Screw it, ugly will do for a minute. Make a few bucks and scale. I can then odd job it out, make a bit more and scale again. There will come the day that my competitors look at my stuff and MC Hammer's most famous song starts playing in their mind.

So I'm here to learn. I hope to help out if I can, but also get feedback on technical sticking points. I've only been creeping this group for a short time, but I can tell that the mods and the community is strong. Id like to be apart of it and help to prove what focus and drive can accomplish.
 
I've been a member on other forums under different aliases. After reading CCarters blog for awhile, I found out about BuilderSociety. I've been reading the Digital Strategy Crash Course and it is absolutely fantastic. 99% of the online forums out there were made to pull money from the noobs with paid memberships. With my limited time on this forum so far, I can say the exact opposite about BuSo. I feel the synergy. I feel the hype. Soon I'll feel the success.

I've only been here for a few days and my life has already improved exponentially. I love the psychology side of business, I love meditation, I love ups and downs of life. I've finally found a place full of people that I can relate to.

Signed, Hercules.
 
Glad you joined and aren't being a lurker! You sound like exactly the kind of person we'll all be happy to see posting around.

What's your experience been like with business? What kind of projects have you pursued?
 
Ryuzaki said:
What's your experience been like with business? What kind of projects have you pursued?
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Looking at where I am now, I would consider myself a jack-of-all-trades. I hate that term but it's the best thing that I have to describe where I am at currently. I have a greater-than-average understanding of SEO, HTML, WordPress, social media platforms, and everything else. Once I get a business going, I want to find an area to really focus on.

I've made a few thousand running with CPA a few months back but it's nothing sustainable and it's something that I really don't like providing (fake game downloads).

At the moment I am working on a small informational website that has around 70 pages in Google and is receiving ~10 organic visitors a day. This was a site that I picked up from a friend for free and have been doing it on the side.

I know that I am capable of so much more, so I am going to read through the entire 30-day series while pondering a few ideas.

Cheers!
 
Been lurking and following the odd thread here. Was meaning to get involved so here I am.

Bit of background on me:
Been doing SEO for 6-7 years. Whitehat turned Blackhat. I was content running 1 main WH site for a good few years intill G decided to throw me a "thin content" penalty (the content was not thin in comparison to the rest of the niche). Anyway, delving into the darker side of SEO taught me a lot, I'm far more analytical than I'd ever have been continuing with initial site. I've learnt the importance of scaling and I've earned far more overall than I would have otherwise. I've been recently getting into server admin, a bit of programming, split testing and tracking (something a huge number of SEOs overlook).

The rainy day fund has accumulated nicely and with the increasingly difficult Google algo , I'm toying with the idea of starting some more long term projects/businesses. This seems like the right place to get started.
 
Welcome!

I lost a very legit site to the thin content penalty once. It wasn't a huge site, but it wasn't thin content either. The only thing I could figure was that was their thinly veiled cover story for whacking affiliate sites. At the same time a lot of other people on forums and skype chats were saying the same thing. Everyone was getting hit on the same type of sites.

When I began to think about what was happening, I realized that in my haste I wasn't no-following any of my affiliate links, and they represented at least 90% of outbound link profile.

I agree with your assessment of server administration, coding, and split testing. Lots of people never bother to learn, and it costs them dearly whether they know it or not. Glad to hear you're going to start up another long-term project. It's what I get excited about.

Consider starting a case study so we can follow along and help! See you around the forum
 
I've spent some time looking for a quality forum that wasn't either 1) too massive and filled with idiots or 2) too small and completely dead. Looks like I found a good place here!

My backstory: I work in the internet marketing industry and recently left a job at a successful PR firm to go out on my own. I make websites for small-medium businesses and I've managed to match my salary at the firm within the first three months.

I was more on the web design side of things than seo & lead gen, but I'm decent enough at both to get by. However, I'm not the type of person who's content with just being "decent" so I'm dedicating some time to becoming as good as I can be at this -- first for myself (for funsies) and then eventually offer it to my clients for (moneys).

Looking forward to contributing where I can.
 
I can second that with no doubt. The amount I learned here in such a short time is overwhelming!
It feels like half of my bookmarks are BuSo.

But the thing that amazes me the most is the outstanding use of taylor swift gifs. Speaks to me on a spiritual level.
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Hey guys thought I'd introduce myself. My name is Marcus or Blue. As you can see I've been lurking since last year but took way to much time off the site and internet marketing. From the very beginning I didn't think I could contribute any thing of value. I was content to be a leech, but this is part of a new mindset I'm trying to change. Consumer to producer and adding value is the way. Glad to be be able to be here and start learning appreciate the work of @AffEngineer for starting this awesome place.Also a big shoutout for @CCarter for all those awesome post on wickedfire and here especially the crash course.

I'm 20 years old I learned about internet marketing its power from reading a post on wicked fire. Since then its changed my outlook on life and whats possible.

As far as what skills I posses I really don't have any. I'm on my second pass through of the digital course and currently taking notes. I'm also improving grammar and writing daily to overcome a shyness to writing content and expressing opinions. Im also taking the Web Odin front end development course to get me going in development. I've bought hosting and manually installed WordPress 3 times already trying to figure out what the heck is going on. Its a slow process, another thing I'm trying to change about me . The laziness mindset

Perhaps when I say I don't have a skill its not entirely true. I do think I have what it takes. A small fire to not end up working jobs I've been apart of(no offense pops is blue collar). I'm a first generation American my parents took a risk . I could be back in the old country farming corn with my cousins.
But these last 2 years out of high school have lit a fire to never go through that again (God Bless the guys who worked repairing sewage lines with me and the ball sweating factory crew:smile:) .


Any way I'll soon be posting a follow along where you can see me blunder my way through, and you'll hopefully smack some sense into me.
 
You've got a fantastic storyline to your life that can propel you forever. I think about what my ancestors went through to achieve the things that I take for granted today. I'm 2nd generation I guess, not sure how to calculate it. My grandparents came to the United States. You're even closer to the game changing move. It's almost an obligation for us to not be consumer mindless robots in the system and to be the ones who create the system, create the jobs, create the products. And of course, reap the massive benefits.

Welcome to the forum. I'm excited to follow along your follow-along!
 
CCarter said:
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Welcome to BuSo!
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Ryuzaki said:
You've got a fantastic storyline to your life that can propel you forever. I think about what my ancestors went through to achieve the things that I take for granted today. I'm 2nd generation I guess, not sure how to calculate it. My grandparents came to the United States. You're even closer to the game changing move. It's almost an obligation for us to not be consumer mindless robots in the system and to be the ones who create the system, create the jobs, create the products. And of course, reap the massive benefits.

Welcome to the forum. I'm excited to follow along your follow-along!
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Very much appreciated guys. Ryuzaki your completely right! It keeps me up at night knowing that I cant waste this opportunity.
 
Mont here. Some of you know me from other forums, but a newbie as of today on BoSu. 14-ish years in the game as an Advertiser, health & beauty space mostly. Started in the IM game in law school, still going strong about 15 years later. SEO, PPC, you name it, I've dabbled in it. Also own an aff network, a law firm, a leadgen company, a couple other random businesses.
 
Welcome. That's an impressive IM resume!

How long would you say your ramp up period was before you were absolutely slaying it?

Sounds like you got into the right niches at the right time where link spam and re-bills were the ticket. Did you dabble in that? What I'm really trying to ask is, what method (PPC, SEO, etc) was the snowball that kept your operation growing?
 
Ryuzaki said:
Welcome. That's an impressive IM resume!

How long would you say your ramp up period was before you were absolutely slaying it?

Sounds like you got into the right niches at the right time where link spam and re-bills were the ticket. Did you dabble in that? What I'm really trying to ask is, what method (PPC, SEO, etc) was the snowball that kept your operation growing?
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If I'm being completely honest, I was quite lucky in my timing. I had worked a littlle bit with a buddy in college who was in the e-commerce space, so I knew my way around enough that when I launched my own company in 2001, I was ahead of the learning curve. Google didn't exist yet, and buying PPC ads (through companies like Overture, AltaVista, Lycos, and Dogpile) was brand-new, with few competitors, and very cheap. Could buy clicks for pennies, and convert them to nickels in product sales. Now, there is so much more competition, traffic costs are exponentially higher, and there are lots of competing offers.

I was fortunate enough to build up a war-chest early on when the competitive landscape was easier, so that I could pivot and do new things as the old ways of making online monies dried up and became harder. The first year after college that I worked on the IM biz full-time, I basically hit a homerun: I made more than I knew I'd ever make going into the corporate/legal work as I had planned, so became an entrepreneur then and never looked back. If I had gotten into the game 10 years later, I don't know that I could have been as successful early on in my IM career, The Internet was a "known" thing by then.
 
I've been a lurker for a while and recently read the crash course and decided it was time to join, learn and contribute.

I'm a web developer during the day but due to my age and lack of degree, i'm not making as much money as i'd like. I work at a small agency so I help out with ppc campaigns and content schedules for our clients when I am not working on software.

After reading the crash course I've decided to go all in and pull out a couple old domains I have and start building day and night.

Also, if anyone needs help with drupal, symfony or anything related to real estate technology, i'm glad to help where I can.

Thanks
 
dissidence said:
due to my age and lack of degree, i'm not making as much money as i'd like
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Change your thinking towards money and you'll change your circumstances. Age and degrees are not a requirement for generating money. It's only a requirement depending on the path you've chosen. If you choose the 9 to 5 life then yes, you'll continue to think of money as a return on your time in exchange for labor. Switch to thinking that money = reward for your higher achievement/creativity, and you'll realize time is only a factor if YOU make it a factor. If you get creative and create a service or product which there is demand for and people are will to exchange their money for access to your creativity solution, time is no longer a factor in your circumstance of how much you can make. You'll no longer be laboring for $X amount of dollars in exchange for Y amount of labor hours.

The crux is you'll need to put in Z amount of hours in the beginning until you get things off the ground and that Z amount of time = $0 at that current moment. And in the mist of it you might fail. Most people aren't willing to risk that Z amount of hours for $0. Most people aren't willing to risk even one failure. The different between the people that win and the people that lose are the winners have failed over and over and will continue to risk failure over and over - those failures lead to their eventual success. But the losers, they aren't even willing to risk failure OR they failed once or twice and gave up cause the fall was too great. The deciding factor between the winner and loser is their thoughts and what they are willing to sacrifice in order to attain their goals.

For most they'll need to switch their thinking completely before they finally fly.

Welcome to Buso.
 
I hadn't heard of Symfony. Is Drupal built on it? Lavarel is another framework I've seen used quite a bit.

Welcome aboard!
 
Ryuzaki said:
I hadn't heard of Symfony. Is Drupal built on it? Lavarel is another framework I've seen used quite a bit.
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It's really just a set of php libraries with a framework as well, but you can use the components individually, which is where the awesomeness of the components come in.

Drupal 8 is built on some of symfonys components, I believe laravel uses symfony too. Mautic is built almost completely on the symfony framework. It's really great for php projects.

CCarter said:
Most people aren't willing to risk even one failure. The different between the people that win and the people that lose are the winners have failed over and over and will continue to risk failure over and over - those failures lead to their eventual success. But the losers, they aren't even willing to risk failure OR they failed once or twice and gave up cause the fall was too great. The deciding factor between the winner and loser is their thoughts and what they are willing to sacrifice in order to attain their goals.

For most they'll need to switch their thinking completely before they finally fly.
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This is what i'm trying to work on. I've been stuck in the billable hour, 9-5 mindset and am working to get out of it.

Success is sustainable income and failure is useful data. I just need to learn to work without expectations of immediate compensation, and always be prepared for failures.

Thanks for the warm welcome BuSo, i'm glad to be here.
 
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