JoeBailey.ORG

I’m not sure which is worse, video games or TV. But if you’re in to video games, you probably need to take a break. I’ve found myself spending more time playing video games than TV. It all came to reality one day after I completed a game. At the end, it told me I had played for 100 hours. Holy cow, 100 hours. If I was able to work and make money for that amount of time, I could have made a ton.

The key to remember is, is this thing I’m doing better than something else. Heck, even sleeping would have been a better use of my time. Also, is that show you’re watching making you smarter? Chances are it’s not. Tomorrow morning, try to remember what show you watched last night. You may not even remember.

Total time savings, 100 hours.

Ok, every day, I go through each day and come up with tons of ideas. Easily I can get distracted and start on a tangent search on the internet only to forget my original task.

Big tip, keep Outlook or, if you’re online all the time Remember The Milk, open. Each time you have an idea, post it in as a task. Later on when you review your tasks, decide if the thought or idea is worth researching. Chances are, it’s not. This idea alone could save you at least one hour a day.

This comes up every once in a while from my clients. A company, names not mentioned, will send you a domain name renewal letter in the mail. I’m not sure if you should call it a scam or not, but it will definitely cost you more money. What these companies do is find out when your domain name expires, or find a version of your domain name and send you the letter. The letter looks pretty convincing, but essentially, it’s a company trying to renew your domain name from your existing company and charge you up to 10 times more than you can spend. Don’t fall for it. Contact the person that registered your domain to find out the real situation. If you’re spending more than $10 for you domain name, contact JoesWebShack.com for a cheaper price. That’s what we use.

Ok, times can be tough. So, I tried to come up with some ideas to produce some recurring revenue. My first experiment is to market one of my existing reseller programs Joe’s Web Shack. This program allows me to make a small amount of money without doing anything, with the exception of marketing (key number 1). As a web developer, my initial reasons for joining this reseller program was to capture any revenues I was sending to others. Since this reseller program allows me to sell domain names, hosting, etc, it is a perfect compliment to my business. So, back on topic, my goals are to figure out a way to market this product without having to do anything. This way, I can continue to make revenue without adding extra workload to may day.

So, my goals are as follows:
1. Market the site
2. Make money without having to do any work… at some point creating recurring revenue.
3. Have the site market itself

Background of the reseller program:
1. No inventory for me to handle
2. I don’t have to answer customer service questions
3. Recurring customers.
4. Hard for customers to switch
5. Monthly revenue

Later, I should put together a listing of the guidelines for the ultimate company.

So, the idea is to market the reseller program better. I had heard about Google Base and wanted to try it. I had heard about it from some of my e-commerce clients. Google Base allows e-commerce companies to submit their products directly into Google’s search. Pretty cool idea considering it takes less that 24 hours to get listed. Why spend hours worth of time in SEO when you can type directly into

So, I started simply and here are the steps I took. Total time, maybe one hour.
1. I chose a base item
2. Signed up for Google Base
3. Listed the item
4. Watched it in the reports.

I soon became addicted to the reports as I saw the number of views grow. Later I realized some of those numbers were me.

Results, not too bad. Here’s what I found:
1. I can get listed extremely quickly
2. I was able to attract customers and links very quickly although, not a ton. But, that may be because of the product.
3. After adding several other products, I was able to quickly see which products generated more links and clicks.
4. Next step is to focus and zoom in on the most popular products.

Recommendation: Go for it. Google Base is definitely worth it. My next step will involve automating this process so I don’t have to touch it again.

Yes, times are tight, if you want to save money on your website, you can do it. Psst… This is information from inside the web programmer world.

1. Transfer your domain name to a cheaper location – Some companies charge you up to $50 each year for a domain name. Don’t forget, you can get a domain name for under $10. Potential savings: $40 a year

2. Change hosting companies – Hosting can also be cheaper. If you are using what is called “shared hosting” you can definitely get cheaper hosting. Most small businesses in the world use shared hosting. Dependent on what you need, you can find hosting for less than $5 a month. Potential savings: $20+ per month

3. Hire a different web company or firm. Rates can get pretty high. For example, the people that hire me, typically charge their clients at a rate of $125-$200 per hour. I’m not billing them that rate.

4. SEO – How much are you paying for your SEO?.. and is it working. Remember, don’t hesitate to make a decision and move on.

5. Are you paying for other services for your website? If so, chances are, you may not need these items. Today, a lot of things can be done for free or may be unnecessary.

6. Submit articles, products, etc to Google Base. Yes, you can add your information DIRECTLY into Google. Why try to get into Google, just do it.

7. Turn on Spam filtering or get it. Chances are you spend a certain amount of time each day deleting spam. This time could be spent on running your business. If you have a contact form on your website, don’t forget to add some way to ensure an actual person is filling out your contact form ( captcha ) This eliminates unwanted emails from your website.

8. Use email marketing. Yes, I know there is a lot of spam out there, but people still look at their emails. When you sign up for email software, it should be less than $10 unless you are sending more than the average number of emails. Potential savings: $5+ per month

9. Pay attention to how your advertising online, where your spending money online, and what is successful. I stick with the 80/20 rule. Keep duplicating and enhancing that top 20% of your online ads. Remove the bottom 80%. Continue doing this until your satisfied with the results.

10. Last but not least. Always trust the people you work with. If your gut tells you something is not right about a project, quote, or cost, move on. Web costs can be expensive and can add up fast. Also, choose the right individuals to do the work. Keep in mind, in our world there is NOT 1 person that can do everything extremely well. There are typically 2 general categories of web people, those that can make your site look good and those that can make your site run.

If you would like to save some costs on domain names, hosting, etc, please visit www.joeswebshack.com

If you would like some help with some programming on your site, please contact me here through the site.