The Entrepreneur’s Best Friends

I wanted to share something with you today, that is inspired by an Email that I received from a long time source of 'niche information…

I was thinking after I received this Email – I'll share more about where to signup to get on this list if you wish towards the end of this post.

It's true! Just two little words rule a every Entrepreneur's world…

Risk and Fear

Over the past several years I've been showing people how to make money – I will be the first to tell you that if you take two people and have them do the exact same thing, one will succeed and the other will fail. Why? Because of who they are inside!

Some people are risk avert - always wanting guarantees… thinking that if someone would just show them step-by-step how something works for others, then they too could do it and be successful.

Some people love taking risks in certain parts of their lives – they will jump out of perfectly good airplanes, or ride their motorcycle without protective gear… almost as if they love taking risks with their lives.

Fear, or lack of fear seems to be what makes these people take the risks that they do…

So what makes one person successful and another not?

I really do think that it has to do with how we each emotionalize the implied Risk in starting a business in the form of Fear…

I know – blah blah blah…

But seriously – if you are one who is so fearful of failure, then maybe you should stay in your cubicle. If you are one who is always looking for the 'sure thing' – then maybe you should just work for someone else.

Being in business takes a certain hardness, and fearlessness if you will. Something inside that makes you decide – then stick with it until it DOES work.

I've been self employed most of my life – something happened to me when I was a kid… well several things happened to me. If you talk to some friends they will tell you that it was probably the screwdrivers in the outlet – but I'm not sure that that was it…

Lets just say that my father told me over and over that I didn't have to be like all the other kids – that I should do what I wanted to do. The funny thing is that when you are a kid you have little fear. No one has filled your head will all of those negative things that would happen to you if you did something one way or didn't do something another way. I will reassure you that I have failed – I've failed a lot in my lifetime. In the beginning it hurt and made me wonder if I stopped being different would I not fail… Hmmm…

Everyone has failures – I've had two marriages fail… but I've got 4 wonderful children (and one grand daughter) as a result. So the risk worth it for me! Will I do it again? Probably, but without producing anymore children of course – too old for that you know! (wink)

I've also had many business ventures fail, or not make it as I had hoped. But I have also had several very successful businesses and once you figure out what doesn't work – you just need to remember that and not do it ever again! Figure out what works and keep doing it over and over.

Think outside the box – smaller is better!

I think what hits most people too is that they think inside the box about business! They think that you have to create something that may become too big to handle – something that just keeps growing and growing… maybe out of control!

The last very successful business that I started did just that – and now there are more than a dozen employees. I am glad that I'm not there to deal with all of that! I like it small – maybe several small businesses at once – easier to deal with…

Ok – so what does this have to do with everything that I have been talking about?

Think… if you find a way to make a couple hundred a month and then you create another – not just like it – but the same business model – all making small amounts of money – all simple to manage – and all easy to do… and duplicate!

That's how we make money the easy way on the Internet!

Do you want me to do this for you?

Do you want me to take you by the hand and show you?

If you answer YES to both or either of these, are you willing to give me a piece of it forever? Think about it and let me know – I'm curious what you are thinking.

The Email that sparked my blog post today was sent to me by Paul Evens. You can check out his nichology site by clicking here.

Also – if you are looking to get started making money online then I would recommend two programs/systems to review – I own both of them (no I wasn't given a copy to say it's good!) and these two are really written for the newbie – get started today.

First program by George Brown – Google Sniper – just click here

Second program by Michael Jones – The Affiliate Code – just click here

I have purchased several other (new) programs and I'm not impressed by what I'm seeing – too much of the 'me too' thing going on. I've even requested refunds! See – that happens… but know that I am evaluating if these new programs show something new, or if a newbie would be able to make it work…

I wish that I could take away all of your fear and tell you that there is no risk. The truth is that the risk of failure is much greater if you do absolutely nothing.

To your continued success…

Michael Hobach

Making Some Money NOW!

I've been sitting back working on a new project here – I'll be sharing it with you shortly, but right now lets talk about making some money NOW!

If you are on my lists you know that I've been promoting several systems.

Have you had a chance to download your personal copy yet?

Have you read through the material and watched the videos yet?

Have you implemented your first affiliate presell site yet?

WHY NOT?

Below is a screen capture of the ClickBank account that I am using to capture my commissions as I start building this part of my business. Click on the graphic to open a popup with the full-sized image…

This account shows almost $600.00 paid out for just 2 affiliate promotions that I have setup as described in Google Sniper. I set these up a little over a month ago. Actually there is about $1,000 earned, however ClickBank holds the funds to make sure that there are no cancellations. Can you do this? I'll bet you can – if you JUST DO IT!

BTW - the new system by Michael Jones – The Affiliate Code – will also get you started. Actually, TAC has a bit more detail in the videos and system information that gives you more options. Options are good!

Important Note – I've got one site that I setup in the tattoo niche that seems to be overlooked by Google. Now this isn't unusual, and it is important that you realize that not everything that you put out there WILL be evaluated by the search engines. Actually, I can't get Google to crawl this site for the last 4 weeks! Oh well – I'll keep it going and eventually Google will crawl it – or index the current pages.

One more thing – Commission Junction surprise!

I also setup a simple CPA offer through my Commission Junction account. I logged in today to find that I had $80.00 deposited into my bank account from this offer – I do have a small site (page) tied to this, and it is starting to generate some $$. You can't expect everything to happen at once – but these small positive accomplishments will only lead to more and more of the same. Eventually this too will be generating a good six figures!

Now realize that I'm not here to teach you how all of this works! The sytems/programs that I'm promoting are excellent in the way that they explain what you need to know to get started. It might be too much to expect that they explain everything – really! There is no way that one Internet Marketing program can cover everything! I will continue to purchase these programs as each one gives me some good information – something that I maybe didn't have before.

Keep learning and seeking out information to add to your knowledge base.

To your continued success…

Michael Hobach

What is it that I know that makes me an expert

I'll bet you are wondering what it is that makes me an expert to sit here and talk to you about making money and especially doing it online…

First – I'm by no means an expert!

I have a good friend who keeps telling me that I'm an expert in Internet Technology and that I keep too much to myself. Well – I do know a lot and I have done a lot… but that doesn't make me an expert – at least not in my opinion!

But here's the thing…

I used to work really hard – you know what I mean! Then things really changed for me and a number of years ago I discovered how it was possible to stop trading my time for a paycheck. I still have family members, friends and neighbors who have asked outloud – how is it that you are able to sit at home and still have all of the things that they work so hard for by going to a job. Actually my ex wife beat on me a lot about not going to work and having a job.

In our lifetime we have been conditioned to believe that we have to work for some big corporation and in return we get paid and have all of these great benefits. Well, I think it's become obvious in the last couple of years that relying on some big corporation for our livelihood isn't the best idea. Our income is defined by our position and company policy. Over achievers seldom receive the compensation they deserve. True – some days we can just show up and still get paid – but is that really fair?

I was raised to be different and think outside the box

My father always – and I mean always, reminded me that I don't have to be like everyone else. I don't have to do what they do or think what they think! So many people are just 'clones' of everyone else around them. Are you?

To make insane amounts of money online and off line requires that you think differently

Personally, I have a desire to make enough money to pay my bills, and live comfortably – not unrealistic! I do want enough money so that I can continue to help others who are less fortunate than me, but the goal is to teach them to help themselves. Our society today does not know how to do that! Truth!

Motivation comes in weird ways

To be honest – a major motivating factor in my life to make a total change on how I earn a living came about in 2001 with some issues with my now ex wife. Divorce was inevitable, and it became clear that I needed to do what I needed to do for myself and my children. Her desires no longer mattered.

The ISP business that I had created, and where I worked long hours, was just another JOB – in fact I worked a lot harder than I did when I had a JOB with a company that I didn't own… duh!

The beginning of the rest of my life

In 2001 when we moved out here to the lake I knew that I would have the environment to work on the things that I really needed to work on, including myself.

I tried a lot of things including Network Marketing – won't ever do that again unless it's just to get a good product at a better price!

I also went back to what I love – truly my passion… the Internet from a marketing and and sales standpoint. You see the business that I was trying to separate myself from was a service company – mostly providing high-speed connections to local businesses. It was very much hands on and more work focused and not really creative focused for me. The technology behind everything that you see online is interesting to me – and it was my goal to make it simple to implement and easy to scale.

I do have another passion – Real Estate. I have little fear of failure when it comes to things like Real Estate (RE). Well actually I have little fear of failure when it comes to just about anything – except family!

My passion in Real Estate put me on a quest to become more knowledgeable about Real Estate transactions – at the time I had bought and sold 9 homes (that I have lived in) and bought and sold 2 commercial properties.

I went to school to get my license to originate mortgages – the learning experience was what I really wanted – I had no intention of ever originating a mortgage though. In my life I have done this a lot to learn things that I want to know. Yes I did get my license in the state of Wisconsin – no it's no longer active as I let it expire.

At the same time that I started doing some RE Short Sales I also got involved online with some other people doing the same. I came to realize that there was demand for what I knew about RE and Foreclosures – mind you I learned what I knew on my own. As a result of my new front line passion I started writing e-books and training material. Amazingly I was making more money with almost no work right from the start. I started doing more and more and the more I integrated the 'technology' part, the more money I was making – again with almost no real work on my part!

The rise and fall of a 'niche'

The Real Estate Short Sale / Foreclosure market online was truly one of those huge niches that we all would love to be a part of. I was, and for the most part I did everything right! The one thing that I did wrong was I focused on just one niche and I didn't pay attention to what was really going to happen to it when things changed in the market and our economy. We all saw it coming – but I'm not sure that everyone really knew what it meant. Now we do – that niche is still there, but there are no buyers of the things that we were selling anymore. Rather, I should say that the buyers are still there, but they are trying hard to keep their head above water so they aren't able to spend the money. Fair?

The point is that most people who buy things like my books are those who want to be a Real Estate Investor. Some are already REI's and they wanted to know more on the subjects I wrote about. Some are Realtors who where/are trying to learn another way to use what they already know. But the 'buyers' who really mattered were those who saw an opportunity and wanted to do that – most just bought the books that were never read… Remember all the late night infomercials about Real Estate in the 80's and 90's? Yep I had boxes of that stuff too… most buyers never do a thing with their purchase – and now with the economy they can't even imagine Investing in Real Estate. Oh well…

In the mean time

While I was writing my books and marketing them online I discovered how easy it was to make money! Actually I discovered how easy it was to make money online regardless if it was my product or someone else's product. In a previous post here I indicated how I was making six figures on my books and training alone. I didn't mention that I was also making money promoting other people's products and services.

There was one e-book from ClickBank that I was promoting – not promoting hard – but promoting… I was earning just under $4k per month promoting this e-book alone as an affiliate. It was easy! Then all of a sudden that book was no longer available

I was also promoting a service that I found on Commission Junction, that made me about $300 per month. Now this was a $29.99/mo service where I received $2.99 each month on every customer that I referred. Not a lot of money, but the concept was awesome don't you think?

There were other promotions that I offered to my list that earned me a lot of money – it all adds up!

During this time I also did some major eBay stuff too – you see there are distributors out there who will drop-ship products directly to your customers – your company name appears on all material that the customer sees. On eBay they have this 'Power Seller' program… from month one I realized more than $4,000 a month in sales on eBay. After three months I got their 'Power Seller' banner on my store. What was I selling? High-end electronics! My biggest seller was a muli-function – multi-device remote from Sony. It was about $130 and everyone wanted one!

What I've learned and what I'm willing to share with you…

Times are tight and our economy isn't playing nice with our expected quality of life. We can all make small changes in how we think and what we do to improve this.

There is a simple concept to understand - if you don't know something (like how to make money online) you will either have to learn it the hard way – by researching things and trial & error as I have, or you will have to pay to learn how this all works by purchasing programs that teach you the concepts.

Understand too that there is no such thing as just one way to make money online! And there is no ONE program that will show (teach) you everything that you need to know. Stop asking me for the ONE program that you need to purchase!

There is one thing that is not negotiable – you will have to do some work… and you will be out of your comfort zone… and it won't happen overnight!

It will happen – just not overnight!

Stop looking for the quick fix!

If you are broke and unemployed – get a job and take care of business… if you are employed, but just not making ends meet realize that buying a program online will not automatically fix your financial situation!

You won't learn this overnight and you won't start making money today.

Even the no-cost or Free programs have some expense to get started – usually domain name registration (~ $10/yr) and hosting (~ $5/mo min).

Also realize that I am not you – I do have the means and knowledge to get a brand new web site up within minutes – I own servers and have hosting already online. Most people already online have these things in place. I can register a domain name and have it live in 5 minutes – seriously…. I can create the needed graphics or pick a 'theme' within minutes and have it on the web site.

You will be able to do this too – maybe not right now, but if you really want to make money on the Internet then some day soon you will be able to move that fast on a new idea.

Sorry for the length of this post – I get long winded sometimes.

I hope you find some words of encouragement in this post, and it is my desire to motivate you to do what you need to do to get what you want! Does that make sense?

To your continued success…

Michael Hobach

Making A Living Online –

My entire life I have worked hard and done more than my share. In 1995, as I've mentioned before, I started my own ISP business. I have never worked so hard – and I've promised myself that I wouldn't do that again! It wasn't the hard work so much as the commitment of my time.

In 2001 I moved away from the office – I used to live within 10 minutes of the office and datacenter. My time was always being eaten up by the business. I moved to more than 30 minutes from the office and started to pull back – my son was now in charge… well he had the responsibility at least.

I slowly pulled away from the day to day business and started looking at some things that would give me some freedom. You see working for yourself doesn't always mean that you have freedom to do a lot of fun things!

I did take a lot of vacations during the early 2000's – mostly to Florida where I bought a timeshare. BTW – don't ever do this! If you have cash to pay for one of these things like I did then put the money into a condo or some other property. My opinion at this point of course.

In 2004 I dove head first into something that has always been an interest of mine – Real Estate! Yep – I figured out how to flip properties with a single back-to-back closing. I was encouraged to write an e-book and all I will say is that the rest is history!

I've written a number of e-books for the Real Estate niche – and between 2004 and 2007 I made a really good living on these books and marketing to this niche. I also went through a divorce at the same time and my energy was not focused at all from time to time. I did enjoy the automatic income and the easy life. 

You see, there are a lot of ways to make money online. The main point and something you need to really realize – you must set a course and never look back. My books, training, and other online services made me a good chunk of change – actually, I was enjoying online sales in excess of $100k per year just from the sales of my books. In 2008 that dropped to about $30k per year because of the economy and the Real Estate market. Most 'wannabes' just couldn't see how this could work.

Well I can tell you that I've flipped a number of properties for myself and I've overseen a bunch more. On average I would pocket about $19k per transaction. Not too bad considering I just did all of the leg work and thinking…

That's all gone now – I've pretty much pulled out of the Real Estate market niche. I still work on simple projects and maintain several web sites. Actually you can see the part of my collection of my books that still applies to the market today at http://ShortSaleBooks.com – the sales keep coming in, but I can't pay the bills with sales from this one niche.

Over the last couple of years I've worked to get my life back together and to get a better focus on what I was doing – I still earn a good living online, but I'm working to diversify. You see while Real Estate and the RE niche provided a good income for a number of years, it wasn't my real passion. And because the RE niche was a really hot niche at the time – a lot of 'buyers' – it made me a lot of money… I ignored my first rule – diversification.

So what is my real passion? The technology that runs the Internet of course!

I've been involved in technology my entire life – I love to see web sites come to life and I love to see them rise to the top of the search engines. This is where I live…

Now I'm finding a lot of little niches where I can apply what I know – it's working. And I'm going to share some of this with you here on this site so stay tuned.

Here's something interesting – did you know that the tattoo niche is hot but not many marketers are participating… hmmm… I see an opportunity. Let me do some research!

No I don't have any tattoos and I don't know anything about tattoos… although I have dated several women with tattoos…

To your continued success…

Michael Hobach

Build Your Business The Way That I Did In 1995

Back in 1995 I wrote a business plan for a new Internet Business. The business plan outlined a wonderful Internet Service Provider (ISP) business that had the potential to grow into a huge company….

I had big plans – I presented my plan to local business owners, investors, friends and family. The initial startup cost was near $100,000.00 – which was a very conservative amount considering all of the hardware and network infustructure.

So many thought that the Internet was going to be a passing fad – I was told 'Like Pet Rocks!' Can you imagine?

After a while I sat down with my wife and got her to agree to let me purchase one server and some software to see if this was all I said it would be… she agreed! I formed the company as a 'C' Corporation – this would allow me to protect myself and more importantly, to offer stock to potential investors.

It wasn't long – just a couple of months, when I began to see the potential and I put plans into action to fund this venture privately… and to quit my job of 9 yrs – Sr Project Engineer in Research & Development.

(It all started here – click on the image to the left to see when I really started online with ARIN.)

So I cashed in my $40,000 – 401k, and used several credit cards to fund the startup. A total of about $100,000.

Within the first year or so I needed more money to grow the business. You see we were growing at a rate of about 140%/yr – it's near impossible to sustain a brick & mortar business at this rate…. but I had a plan – I started looking for investors to put some needed cash into the business. I was able to raise about $40,000 between 6 private investors. Not a lot, but it helped…

You see this business requires a lot of equipment. The equipment needed to be purchased before the customes came online. So I was investing $10k at a crack to put on new customes.

Eventually I needed almost $1 million to continue with this growth – this was in 2000. I had become friends with two guys who could put this kind of money together, and I set up a meeting with them. I will tell you that this isn't something that I would suggest just anyone undertake. The meeting got me about $200,000 – but I had to give up a good chunk of the company stock that I owned. I gave in and it all worked out…

I won't bore you with all of the details, but today my 31 yr old son runs this company and it does several million in sales each year.

So my point is that if you really want to make money there is a right way to do it… not everyone is able to handle this – today this company is approaching 15 yrs old. It is a wonderful accomplishment for me and for my son continuing on.

To your continued success…

Michael Hobach

MLM and Network Marketing Schemes

I thought I’d cover this early in our discussion – I have been involved with a number of Network Marketing Companies in the past. I have built a downline of several thousand people. I have earned thousands of dollars per month through Nework Marketing – years ago…

I have several really nice suits and cotton white shirts in my closet.

I’ve taken and written off many vacations.

I even purchased for cash a timeshare in Florida just outside of the Disney properties.

I never worked so hard in all of my life!

Some companies have really wonderful products and I still order Nuskin through my distributor account. Other companies have fizzled and all but gone away. Yet others keep going because they make so much money that they can stay alive.

I was a presenter – I had my laptop connected to a video projector and I stood up there talking to the groups that my downline ‘Invited’ to our presentations.

I did in-home demonstrations – I just can’t tell a woman that she has lines and wrinkles in her face that our product would help!

I told people that it was easy to make the money that I made – that I would show them exactly what to do.

Have you been here?

Pay attention to what I’m going to say for the rest of this post…

If a company has a product that is sold through a distribution channel that requires multiple people to earn a commission – no matter how good it is, it is going to be over priced. Remember that the company makes the biggest profit – then all of the ‘Distributors’ down the line to where the product actually gets to the customer. Whew… hard to imagine the whole $$ thing. You have a  $1.00 product that ends up costing the buyer $49.00 because of everyone in between that needs to get a cut.

No matter how good it is it takes a lot of ‘selling’ to convince the buyer that it’s worth it.

Don’t forget the ‘autoship’ product that you have to maintain – $100 of product produces commissions for all of that upline – doesn’t matter that YOU are buying it now does it!

Here is what I really didn’t like about Network Marketing…

My (BIG) income had nothing to do with my ability to sell or market the product(s) – it was directly dependent on how well I recruited, motivated and babied those in my downline.

I stopped counting how many times I heard – "I can’t find anyone to buy this stuff" or "I don’t have any friends who I can recruit"

But this is why I won’t do this ever again – no matter what the product or how close to the top I’m placed. Just never going to happen.

The difference with doing my own thing…

When I have my own company, products, services, etc – I can decide what I’m going to sell today. If wigs that make a woman look like beyonce are hot (look up ‘beyonce wigs’) then I will promote it… if it’s the beginning of the NFL season I want to be able to promote ‘NFL wear’ or Fantasy Football League web sites.

I want to choose what I’m going to sell… something that I know is hot and real people are really buying them!

I don’t want some company to tell me that their product is hot – because that’s what they produce and market – regardless of how cold the market is for their product. Just because they say that their products are needed – it’s the wanted products that I will be promoting!

IMPORTANT NOTE!

Please don’t comment about how the MLM or Network Company that you are with is different. I’ll delete your comment and ban you from this site.

We are not here to promote MLM / Network Marketing as the way to really make money.

To your continued success,

Michael Hobach