The Bragging Thread - Inspire A Newbie

Here's one site for last quarter.

This is within 2 metro areas in the US, with calls being routed on a 1:1 basis, meaning each call goes to a unique service provider within that metro area. Calls are also filtered at the routing level, meaning autodialers and robocalls automatically hit a junk VM box, with the list being updated every 6 hours.

If the call has commercial intent, it's routed to a commercial provider only. I'm in the process of mapping this process out and bringing on more providers, and tripling my cost per call, which this market can sustain fairly easily. For them, each "job" is worth $8k - $56k, with most of their cost to consumer being absorbed by government subsidy.

A small slice of local can make big payouts if you play your cards right.

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I don't drive any fancy cars... Although I have a pretty interesting Jeep wifey and I have built and literally lived in for a few months because we like road trippin.

I'm also not a fan of showing income reports because I think it focuses people on the wrong metric... It is about how much value we give to our audiences that counts.

So here is an analytics screenshot from my wife's site in the last year.

We've probably worked 80% LESS this last year... Honestly slacking a bit on the content marketing side but the traffic keeps coming... Super consistent.

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We do a lot of email marketing and revenue is at new highs even while we are putting in a fraction of the time we used to.

I show this because I really think that this graph (mixed with how little effort we put in during this time frame) is such a powerful example of the kind of lifestyle freedom these businesses can create.

Traffic, leads and sales keep on coming from the work we put in years ago!

You can do this too!

It is like moving a mountain with a spoon, but it WORKS if you stick with it long enough and constantly focus on being more strategic and keep testing your conversion points.
 
I used to be an affiliate. I had like 6 or 7 accounts like this ... annual numbers.... And unlike most, my proft was high. I had a killer azz system. However, had some life changing moments that took me out of the game for a while (used all my money and time) and I lost it all.............

BUT....... i usually do have to re-invent myself time to time and I felt it was a timing thing. I did what was right to help others, lost it all and now I'm onto something new.

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My friend was doing product funnels on FB ads and other methods, which I told him always... He needed to build a brand and when it' peaking heavy... get it aquired by a larger name/brand. Well he tipped me off on something and I found out it sells well.

I branded. And i'm using my own idea. Building a store and brand that I can either sell or get aquired. If i get enough sales, i'll keep building brands under an umbrella to get aquired.

I'll feel amazed If I push this whole idea/concept through. I've got a 2nd product, thats' totally new i could push already as well. Just need more gains.

As you see, i'm praticaly a bum compared to where was at before. This is my sales total from my new site/store (YTD). However, If i can get to front page of search with my 2 brand sites, these numbers for the year will turn weekly. I was front page for a day, tasted the promised lands.

(i've made 4 figs in ebay sales earlier but I was banned for drop-shipping)

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Car wise... i got my favorite car... a Jeep Wrangler UNLTD and it came with the built in waterproof Alpine System.... removable front 2 panels.. i love it........
 
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I'll just share some traffic boners and some key info on how they were achieved.

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After this site got hit by pretty much every update, I knew something drastic had to be done. After below changes, it saw a ~75% increase in organic traffic overnight after the March update and is still steadily climbing.
  • Link detox
  • Complete re-design with a better WordPress theme (in terms of size, quality and performance of code)
  • Moved to faster hosting setup
  • Dropped silo menu structure in favor of lower click-depth
  • Pruning of pages that didn't perform well or cannibalized with pillar pages
  • Added ~20 decent guest post links on tier 1 + PBNs on tier 2
That's all actually. The content was already pretty decent before (WDF*IDF optimized and all), which didn't keep the site from getting hit.

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This is just a relatively new niche site where just everything seems to go well. Usually seeing a decent and lasting boost with each update.
  • WDF*IDF optimized content
  • Only very relevant pages linked contextually - always linking back from each page I link out to
  • Link building solely relies on guest posts with PBNs on tier 2 and some manual outreach for insertions
  • Pretty much money content only. 20% or less purely informational types of pages.
  • Fast hosting + Google CDN + Google DNS
  • Some traffic from Facebook (ads)
 
Some great success stories in this thread I think.

I am def. still a newbie in the affiliate game, but I am pretty chuffed about the nice growth my affiliate site saw in the relatively small Scandinavian market. Started it with my 2 younger brothers (who were aged 15 and 20 at the time) and it took us 9 months to get any sort of organic traction, but after that we got there.

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I would say some contributing factors were:
  • Acquiring non-paid for links through things like
    • Unlinked mentions (of my name)
    • Asking for links from places where I've contributed with content in the past (guest blogged)
    • Getting interviewed or featured in some kind of community style "meet the contributor" post (and then getting a link from that post)
    • Getting links from friends in the industry and from the blogs of the companies I worked at
  • Being "first" in a low-competition and fast moving affiliate niche.
  • Creating content that is well optimised in terms of on-page SEO + knowing what keywords to focus on.
What's encouraging is that we are beating our affiliate partners (larger Swedish e-commerce retailers) for commercial search terms around the products we are promoting. I think this is largely because they are not very good in terms of their on-page....

Where to from here?
Sadly I've had less time this year to spend on my site and the site has consequently "dipped" since mid-June. Not sure if this related to Googles update or not actually.

Anyways, being on this forum gives me a ton of inspiration to pick things up again. Will be getting back to producing some fresh content sooner rather than later.
 
Yessss my eyes are tired of seeing countless "gurus" telling me to buy their course to show me how they made 50k in month blah blah blah and with only FB ads or Google ads.

Yeah. Scams. Pretty much sums it up. Feels good to see my old post here and how I predicted the weekly sales if I kept active. Definitely did it.

I was at 16 sales a while back. Today I'm at 227 sales today. 1 product store. :D If i can reach 1000 sales by Christmas, would be great!

I need to hit cave man mode again... go to my cave away from the world... i do best alone.

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I don't like to brag, so I will post this more like an inspiration rather than bragging.

How I started
Long story short - I started doing SEO + aff. marketing when I was 18 yrs old kid still in high school. I came from a poor background, so all my life I wanted that $$$. My site took off within 1 year after I started.

Some key points that might help someone with motivation:
1) I barley had any money for the domain/hosting
2) I am not a native English speaker, but I still wrote all my articles and with time I got significantly better at that
3) I had no idea what Wordpress is. Yes, I was pretty good with computers as any kid spending majority of time with them, but I had no real prior knowledge like coding, marketing etc.

So, no matter your current situation, you can succeed if you keep going and don't quit. There is no such thing as "maybe it's not meant for me to succeed in this lifetime" - been there, thought that, it wasn't real.

Most people think that way. Only difference is if you will be able to get out of that "mental program" and write a new one in your subconscious mind (yes, I am super into self-growth stuff for the past 2 years - my life has never been the same since).

Where am I now?
Back to the present - I've been doing this for already 6 years full-time and it has given me freedom that most people can't imagine.

Benefits
I work when and where I want. I work how I want. I can take a vacation whenever I want. It can be as long as I want. I can travel the world. It gives me a huge freedom.

My biggest pitfall
But it also comes with struggles - my greatest one is to keep going when there is nobody pushing you. Tbh, getting comfortable with my current level is my "biggest" enemy for years.

I've earned 5-12k/m since I started 6 years ago.. It allows me to live a pretty good life, but somehow it took away that "hunger" to reach 20k/50k/100k a month. Maybe BuSo will give me that extra push or motivation to get out of my comfortable box.

My proudest achievement
Not sure if proudest, but definitely one of the TOP3 professional achievements in my SEO career is that 2 years ago I was accepted for an apprenticeship, to work for a very well-know SEO guy in Thailand. At the end it wasn't exactly what I was hoping for, but the fact that I made it there and crushed it, still warms my heart (more like ego haha).

My most profitable day
My story is already too long, so I will keep it like this. I have attached a screen with my most profitable day so far (actually it was more, but I don't have screens from other aff. platforms of that day):

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Made a drastic decision to not ship product and make a fresh batch after so much counterfeiting. I own my logo/trademark however, so aiming to cut off the people selling '2nd hand' or nonbranded product. The delay caaused me to lose mys tripe but who cares...I rather have problems on where to recieve money than "no money" problems

I'm actually up to about $36k in sales at this point.... And still not 1 year in. I didn't make the 1k sales goal but I do think it's possible with more pushing. If I can push to front pages of a few keywords.......... Sky's the limit..

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And the funny thing is, i was trying to sell this business for $7k just a few months ago ... just struggling with life...............

Stick through the struggle. Stay an owner.

I'm getting a new webste soon and finally adding more product. I'll have at least 4 shortly. Hopefully goes over well.

September was 227 sales.
 
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Some motivation for guys that feel depressed because of this whole covid thing.
We had two really solid months so far. The numbers are from two new supplement projects which we focused on when the lockdown started. Being locked in not having a reason to socialize or go out turned out to be a huge productivity boost (who would've thought?). All figures are in Euro and we have around 40% margin on the revenue. This is done with only 4 fulltime staff as I think automation is the key.

If you feel down these days, just realize that people are still banking hard during these times. Don't let the peasants and NPCs drag you down with their gloomy "oh my god can we please have 2019 back?" shit. Unplug yourself from social media and all news related sites, it's the biggest plague during this time and it will definitely fuck with your life if you don't quit it cold turkey.
 
Had a post on Medium for only 3 days, and already earned 2cents, it may not sound huge it is a start that is what matters. Taking action steps and not looking back and thinking if only.

I hate to be that guy but... Actually I love to be that guy - But some of you guys' thought process is completely fucked up.

If I can walk around town and pick up change off the ground and make more money than you - you shouldn't be patting yourself on the back.

You have to make a "quantum leap" in your thought process. You have to change the level of continuum you are operating on cause if you go after pennies you get pennies.

Encouraging this level of hustle is like encouraging someone to half-ass on an SEO project for 12 months in a journal to end up trying to make $10 a month. That shit makes us all look stupid.

It's a hard truth, but what it takes to get from $0-$10, or $10-$100 are completely different mindset to break the $1000 a day, $10,000 a day, and $100,000 a day revenue mark. Each one of those levels requires you to push yourself out of your comfort zone more and more.

Basically doing the process that takes you from $0-$10 WILL NEVER work to make that $100,000 a day revenue day. It's literally a different continuum.

Come on guys pennies? WTF man. Billions of dollars exchange hands on the internet daily.

Hustle fucking harder and stop pretending to yourself that you are giving it your all. If a homeless man can make more money than you daily there is nothing to celebrate.

The thought process of "celebrate every little win" is formed from mediocre thinking. You have to absolute stop that shit. Set high goals and magically you'll obtain them.

Your whole thought process is fucked.
 
Mi Amor prefers the peanut butter color interior in her 2021 model...

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I ain't even going to lie, it does look good. Dan Peña is still coming in loud and clear...

What's the car model?
I don't know why I thought it was obviously but it's not from the photos: 2021 BMW 540i
 
Touching $10K in earnings as I mark my first year anniversary in Digital Marketing. Holy shit, I still can't believe it. It has already become "meh" now that I have achieved it but I think it is important to acknowledge the small wins to keep going.

Still stuck in college which is annoying but I am going full throttle so that I can retire in a couple of years.

Really grateful for all the support I have gotten from this community.
 
I made money with paid traffic to affiliate offers and went full-time into running my own stuff starting over 12 years ago now. You can get your profit up fast in that game but also it disappears pretty quickly as well.

Dabbled into SEO back in 2016 with some limited investments. Probably 90% of the time/money was wasted to start. But some projects came through.

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This is just 1 of a number of sites at this level. There have been plenty of traffic dips but with time and a few changes things just keep coming back stronger.

Have some plans for some new sites that will achieve 10x this in 1-3 years' time no problem. Just takes time.

Pick boring/large niches so that your success is not limited by some tiny niche. Don't do the stuff everyone else is chasing, find the super boring stuff. There are so many billion-dollar niches that are incredibly unsaturated while everyone piles into the same areas.
 
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