This is a guest post written by Jennifer, the Student Relations Intern with StudyBlue.com, an online community of students dedicated who believe in efficient and effective studying for all (and for free).

Over the past few years, new technologies have allowed students to study more efficiently and effectively. Many services have emerged that provide students with new learning platforms, such as StudyBlue.com. StudyBlue is one of the largest online study groups for college and high school students, as well as educators who embrace technology.

By using StudyBlue, students are able to upload class notes, create online flashcards, study on their mobile phones and set reminders for when to study key concepts. If that weren’t enough, StudyBlue has partnered with Evernote, a useful storage system that allows students to access notes, files and scanned handouts from any device at any time.

This integration lets students sync their Evernote and StudyBlue accounts. That means notes taken on Evernote can be easily converted to online flashcards on StudyBlue.

Check out the video below to find out how easy it is to create online flashcards from your notes. Be sure to check out the Evernote blog for more information.

When I bought Cloud Blogging the very first day Glen Allsopp promoted it to one of his groups of subscribers, I didn’t realize that I had just purchased lifetime membership into a comprehensive course that will continually grow and become even more valuable. I didn’t realize that I would be able to ask Glen and Dirk deBruin (Diggy) questions directly and get direct answers – as well as learn from all the other questions and answers of other members. I only thought I was buying an ebook or some other static product, because the price was incredibly low for such a great value. If you’ve read any posts or ebooks by Glen Allsopp before, you understand why I was “hungry” to read anything new he had to tell us, and he doesn’t have a lot of products out there. In fact, I’m only aware of one other, so I didn’t want to miss this! Cloud Blogging is the most definitive guide to growing a profitable and popular blog.

Glen is totally authentic and open with his writing and advice, and he goes into every aspect of blogging, from blog design to content, to traffic generation, to SEO, to monetization,…and also includes in-depth interviews with 12 A-list bloggers, going into detail about how each blog achieved success. Many other experts write PLENTY of posts and ebooks about how to blog successfully, of course, but they’re usually laced with every sort of affiliate links so we never know what we really need and what the blogger just threw in there hoping to make a little more money! In Glen’s case, he is very honest and wants to help us to succeed. Really once we buy Cloud Blogging we don’t need to spend another penny except to purchase a domain and hosting, if we don’t already have them.

The course is divided into sections, with complete but easy to follow steps to take if you want to dominate the blogosphere and become an A-list blogger. There is SUPER easy navigation, so you can follow the guide in sequence or go directly to any section you like. Also there is navigation to get directly to the discussion of each section, and to me that is getting to be the best part. There, people ask Glen questions I used to Google for endlessly, and he answers quickly and specifically. What theme should I use? What should I do if I’m not an expert on this niche yet there are plenty of others who are? What plugin did you use to make this or that happen?

The best thing of all to me is that this is not a course where I have to spend hours in it – or implementing its ideas – all at once. I’m not really going to have much time to do anything until late August, as far as writing a lot of content or overhauling my blogs, but this is the kind of information I can put to use immediately, five minutes at a time. The course is so well-organized that I can read a section during my lunch break, enjoy reading the questions and answers by the other members, and even ask a question of my own. Once I do get a big block of time, I will waste no more of it searching endlessly for blogging advice and changing my strategy over and over!

Cloud Blogging comes with a 60 day risk-free guarantee. That is huge. Sixty days is a long time to have access to all of this material and try some of the strategies and decide if it’s right for you. I myself ordered with no hesitation, because like I said, Glen Allsopp is the real deal. I noticed the price has gone up at least once since I ordered – he’s not one who pretends that he’ll raise the price then doesn’t do it. He does it! So if you want this course – order today!

Remember your readers have put their trust in you

These days a lot of us are looking for great niches that will make us loads of money so we can have lots of passive income and never be forced to trade hours for dollars again.  We may search for niches based on things like huge search volumes and high CPC, or we may decide that since we have a true interest in something, that would be the perfect niche to start a site about. One thing we may not think about is the real people who come looking for our  information. Those people are most likely not niche marketers, and if they do have a blog it’s just to display their darling baby (or cat) to the world. So when they find your site by searching for “cure [insert disease name here]” or “reverse [insert condition name here]” or “pet [insert animal name]” they may place a lot of faith in the words they find on your site. If you’ve done your best to provide accurate and complete information, well that’s what you want them to do – clicking on your ads and buying your products! But it’s the thought  of those innocent people that makes me very careful about which products to endorse or what to post.

Before a few years ago, I was one of those “innocent people.” If I had a sick pet or just found out that one of my loved ones had a certain medical condition, I’d hungrily search for information on the internet – especially after the vet or physician provided a diagnosis I could search. The internet sometimes seems like a boundless source of answers to our questions, and I trusted all the information I found.  Sometimes I’d be puzzled when one site would disagree with another.. “so how many mg per day of vitamin C does a guinea pig need?”  and sometimes I’d find the exact words of a whole page of text on more than one site, but it never dawned on me that some people might be mindlessly copying information that had never been verified. I just assumed the sites were somehow “sister sites” or something like that.  If you’re writing about cancer or dog training because of the high search volume or CPC, remember to picture the person who’s searching for the information you’re providing. Are you doing a thorough job of getting the very best content for your reader? Are you really helping?

Think of your readers buying the things you recommend

I have one niche site that’s popular with one segment of the population – just for fun let’s say it’s red-haired football players.  I can find plenty of ClickBank products to shove their way, but I really care about those readers, and that makes me stop more often than not and imagine them clicking and buying something because I recommended it. I find that I can’t do it – I can’t let my readers buy junk that’s not really going to “change their lives” at all. Yes, that’s costing me some money, and it may be foolish of me, because they’re going to buy something from someone, but I think it may lead me to do my very best to create my own product for them someday. It will have to be a product that will wring from me every bit of helpful knowledge I can muster up. I’ve already given away most of that knowledge in the many thousands of words I’ve written on that site, but it may be that an e-book or membership site would be a welcome addition when the readers want something more.

When you give them your best, your own site will be its best

Really thinking of and caring about that reader while you write your content may start off as a matter of conscience or “doing the right thing,” but it will also pay off on your site immediately, of course. It’s the good guys, the ones who really want to help the readers, who go that extra mile to write the detailed, accurate stuff that makes it impossible for us to leave their blogs.  If you’re the best source of information about your topic and really dig into it, as if you were doing it for your own family, you’re going to have a blog that we can go to with complete trust, including buying the things that you tell us are good.

Be sure to really think of your readers, especially if you want to write about something like health or how to care for a living thing.  I’m currently working on developing content for a health-related site but that responsibility is taking its toll on me and my spare time. I think for my next niche I’ll just write about something where there are no innocents relying on me, something like politicians or entertainment news.

Photo credits:

dougwoods
jchong

This is a guest post by Lisa Shoreland. You can see her bio below.

If you are currently unemployed, LinkedIn provides a wealth of opportunities by helping you connect to thousands or even millions of professionals in your desired industry.

Over 2 million people sign up on LinkedIn each month, and now more and more hiring managers and recruiters are using LinkedIn to search for job candidates because it is cost-effective, and it also helps them search for qualified employees by simply typing a few keywords into the LinkedIn search field.

Not just limited to the unemployed and university graduates, LinkedIn is also a great tool if you are currently employed as well, as there are numerous groups on the social media site that could help connect you with other professionals in your field of work. (And you never know which connection could help you in the future).

Spruce up your LinkedIn profile

If you are currently unemployed and hoping that LinkedIn could help connect you to a future job or employer, then you should spend an entire afternoon updating your LinkedIn profile.

Essentially LinkedIn acts as an electronic resume, which allows you to write about your past work experience, your education, and your professional skills. Because of this, it’s extremely important to not only list every single job you have ever had, but also fill out the job description field as much as you can, because the more you include in your LinkedIn profile, the more you will show up in someone’s search results.

There is also a little tab in the right hand column of your LinkedIn profile which lets you know how far along you are in updating your profile, and what else you should include to make your LinkedIn profile more attractive.

Making connections on LinkedIn

One of the most important tools and benefits of LinkedIn is that it allows you to make “connections” with other professionals, job-seekers, and most importantly, employers.

Experts recommend that each LinkedIn user has close to 200 connections on their profile, which may seem impossible at first but thanks to the “People You May Know” tool it makes the whole process of making LinkedIn connections a lot easier. You can start out by searching for past co-workers, employers, or even friends and family, and then see where your connections go from there.

There is also a column that shows you how many people have viewed your LinkedIn profile in the past 90 days, as well as how many times you have shown up in someone’s search results. So the more connections you have, the more you will show up in someone’s search result.

Subscribe to groups

LinkedIn groups also act as an effective tool in connecting you to future employers, and allow you to take part in discussions related to your desired field.

If you are currently looking for a job, there are numerous LinkedIn groups that are specific to job searchers. Here are some of the top LinkedIn groups for job-seekers that come highly recommended by career professionals:

• Linked:HR
• Star: Candidate for Hire
• JobAngels
• The Job Board
• The Talent Buzz
• Jobs Alert
• Career Change Central

So whether you’re hoping to find a job on LinkedIn, or you’re simply trying to connect to other professionals in your industry, LinkedIn provides a wealth of career opportunities that are simply a click away.

Even if you’re new to social media and you’re skeptical of the power of LinkedIn, having a LinkedIn profile shows that you are in tune with the latest social media and technology developments, which is an extremely important skill to have especially with the current state of the economy.

Bio: Lisa Shoreland is currently a resident blogger at Go College, where recently she’s been searching for grants and researching no credit check student loans . . In her spare time, she enjoys creative writing, practicing martial arts, and taking weekend trips.

This is such a crazy and awesome idea for an internet business that I just hate that I didn’t think of it myself! We all know about social proof. If someone has thousands of Twitter followers, we think they must be worth following! If someone has loads of friends or gets invited to everything, then we decide they are really awesome and may find ourselves wanting to be a little more like them. And likewise, if we find out that a guy we may never have even noticed before has a nice looking girlfriend, we decide he must be worth a second look after all!  We don’t want what no one else wants.  It’s just human nature.

Enter Cloud Girlfriend. Cloud Girlfriend is a guy’s “girlfriend” on social networks. She talks to him, laughs at his jokes, and she’s purely a “long distance” girlfriend. Sure, a guy could create his own fake Facebook account and try this at home, but it would most likely fall flat as he doesn’t really know how to talk like a girl – or he’d script everything too much exactly like he would do.  This is an unpredictable real person, not a bot, so the effect is genuine.

Will Facebook like this? I guess officially the answer is no. After all, even we poor bloggers are not supposed to create personal accounts for our pen names or our pets – personal accounts are supposed to be real. But how will they find out? Are people going to start reporting accounts that seem to be girls who are just a little too awesome for the guy she’s supposedly dating?  Hah – that might be a little too much for Facebook to check out.

Anyway, we’ll check back in with Cloud Girlfriend when they get it all up and running. I’m curious to see what the pricing will be like. For the women, would it be worth hiring a cloud girlfriend to “steal” a pesky stalker away from you? We’ll see!

Recently I watched a domain expire and finally get dropped, and I was able to buy it soon after it was dropped.  I had found the domain last year, but the owner didn’t want to sell it to me.  So I had to wait a few months, but now it’s all mine, and I only paid $10 for it. This is a thrilling tale that’s been told before by others, of course, but since I’m new at it I thoroughly enjoyed watching the domain go through each stage, until eventually it was mine.

When the one you love belongs to somebody else..

Last June I got the idea to start a site that would help me to make my plan to leave the corporate world someday and devote myself to working online. I’m not a teenager or even a spouse, so this is not a trivial plan, and it’s going to take a while.  In fact, I have an awesome job and the most awesome boss in the world, but the thought of working strictly online is extremely motivating to me. The hours fly all too fast, and I never get tired when I’m innovating and creating something in the internet world.

As I brainstormed for domain names, I came across one I thought would fit perfectly. There was a blog there, but the author hadn’t updated it in months. I emailed him and asked it it was for sale. After a couple of weeks, he replied and said how about $100. I told the guy OK. Maybe I said OK a little too quickly, because then he said he had decided to put it into a GoDaddy auction instead! I didn’t see the domain listed in Godaddy’s auctions and even called them the next day. The support guy at GoDaddy said he couldn’t tell me anything from that guy’s account with them of course, but he could tell me that this domain was not listed in their auctions.

Another expired domain at GoDaddy

Oh well, I put the expiration on my Google calendar and went on to play with other domains and other sites.  The domain expired January 1st of this year though, so I’d check on it from time to time to see if the owner renewed it. He didn’t, but of course we know that domains first have a 45 day grace period, where the owner can renew the domain easily. I started checking again after the grace period was over. So far, so good, he didn’t renew the domain by mid-February.  Then the domain entered the status which appeared to me in DomainTools to be “Redemption,” and that status lasts 30 days.  Of course I had already seen the domain in the GoDaddy auction, but I was more interested in watching the whole cycle of the domain than in owning it by now! I just let nature run its course.

Grace period + redemption period = 75 days

On March 15th, things started to look a little more exciting! When I searched for the domain in Domain Tools, I found that the status was “Pending Delete!” I took a screen shot to document the domain’s journey but for some reason at the time I thought I should mark out the name when I saved the picture. Sorry ’bout that. At any rate, once the domain has passed through the grace and redemption periods, it’s supposed to have five days until the drop! Now…had anyone else backordered it? I didn’t know, but I kept checking on it to see what would happen.

The morning of March 21st, which was the fifth day after the pendingDelete stage started, it looked in DomainTools as if the domain were for sale for $69!

 
A quick click showed me that the domain was now with SnapNames. Available soon! If I’d really wanted to make sure I had a good chance to get the domain, at this point I could have bid on it, paying the $69 to SnapNames (and more, if someone bid against me). Instead I just waited and watched.

Later in the day, after I knew the drop would have taken place, I checked SnapNames one more time. The Status was now Closed!

Apparently no one had had their eye on it. I quickly went to my friend Google Apps in order to get a $10 domain including privacy, and now the domain is mine. I’m brainstorming exactly how I want to do the site, and it will most likely be August or September before I launch it.

One thing – I think I probably goofed up by letting it drop instead of trying to grab it before it dropped. Search engines like a domain with some age on it instead of one that’s brand new like this. On the other hand, this will be a long-term project, and just more things I’m learning along the way!

Photo credit: BigTallGuy

This story reminds me of both Goldilocks and the Three Bears and the parable Jesus told about the seeds getting sown on the path, on rock, and in the thorns. Over the past year and a half, I’ve learned an amazing amount by picking one niche that was TOO SMALL, one niche that was TOO BIG, and now I hope one that is JUST RIGHT. So I’m hopeful that there will be a happy ending, or at least a happy interlude!

Niche 1: In summer 2009, I started trying to decide on a niche for a new blog. I thought about all the things that I’m intensely interested in. Then I thought about the things that make me a little different from other people I know, so that I could try to find a niche that wasn’t already booming with competition. I finally got some ideas then went to the awesome Google Keyword Tool to see how many searches there were for each one. Then I searched each of my keywords in Google to see how many results there were. Doing a quick ratio of searches/results, I quickly saw that one of the niches I was considering had much less competition out there than the others did. Gee, was I a total genius, thinking of something no one else had considered? I even examined some of the competing blogs in that niche and soon saw that there was only one that was very big and active. Game on!

I found a .com domain that had that single keyword plus a little word like “center” on the end of it, and I quickly installed WordPress and started to write. Soon I was getting traffic from Google plus loads of comments as well as wonderful emails from readers. I put Adsense ads on the site plus an Amazon A-store. A year later though I realized: I was making $5 per month on the Adsense and often less than that with the Amazon. The niche I had chosen was just one where people wanted to read blog posts and comment on them. They weren’t looking to click off to an ad. Plus – if I’d looked at the Traffic Estimator I would have seen that the CPC for that keyword is less than 20 cents. Add that to the fact that only a few clicks per day are to be expected, and you get a pretty bad income from Adsense.

The plan: I realize that I can write an ebook or perhaps offer coaching or something of that nature to capitalize on this niche, so this fall once my work schedule lets up a bit I plan to do at least one of those.

Niche 2:In summer 2010, I was much “smarter!” I decided that I wouldn’t worry about competition at all! I’d find a niche that loads of people are searching for, and I wanted it to be one I’d be dedicated to forever. I decided to do a subset of the pets topic. I found a decent domain, but it was harder, because my keyword was multiple words, plus there is a ton of competition in that area. I created a nice little site and wrote about ten posts on it – one for each subtopic of this niche. Once again I added Adsense, plus I found a Clickbank product that fit perfectly. Now to sit back and just watch the money roll in, right?

Wrong. I do get a trickling of traffic from Google, but I stayed distracted with Niche 1, which although it never made money, continued to demand lots of time answering comments and reader emails. So I never wrote more posts, never took the time to see if I could beat the big competition in that pets niche.

The plan: I’ll probably continue adding to this site and keep it another year to see if I can do better. There are certain long tail keywords I keep getting Google traffic for, so one thing I could do is produce a mini-ebook about that topic and sell it or at least develop the topic more fully on my site (with lots of ads all around that area)!

Niche 3:This year I’ve become aware of so many things I didn’t know before. I created a spreadsheet for myself of keywords, number of searches, number of results, CPC, as well as simply the number of Adsense ads I see when I Google that keyword for myself. I combined all of those things to make a sort of “Christie Index” for myself, and I found two promising niches. One is a niche within a disease niche (along the lines of “diabetes medications” or “high blood pressure natural remedies..” and the other is in a technical area I actually do in my day job. Both have a really good CPC, loads of ads, and not as much competition as something like pets or weight loss!

I bought both domains already and am working on the disease site now. I’m finding that even though I’d intended for it to just have about ten posts, I’m having to add more and more as I learn about the topic! I’m hoping this one will at least bring in a trickle of passive income, and what I’ll do differently from a lot of the competition is that I read medical news feed every day so I can update the site with the latest research as it comes out.

I really hope this niche will be JUST RIGHT.

I’d love to hear about your niche site adventures! I have so much to learn, but I’m enjoying every second of it!

Photo credit: sammydavisdog

For the past couple of weeks I’ve been looking for just the right theme for a new niche site, and I believe I found it, but while I was having fun looking around I found three that really struck me as cool – and made me want to hurry up and think of an excuse to use them for something!

A WordPress theme that looks like a paper magazine

We often talk about wanting a “magazine look” for our sites, but this free theme, Fresh Ink Magazine, looks like a real paper magazine, except that it contains the contents of your own blog. The background and header are customizable, of course.

Fresh Ink Magazine Theme

A WordPress theme in book chapters

For several years I’ve thought about writing online fiction, or maybe a how-to book which would be strictly online. But I didn’t want it to just “look like a blog.” Well now if you want to write an online “book” or promote a book you have Chapters by WooThemes! This theme has the chapter navigation up top as well as a lot of other cool features for writing a book-like blog or even promoting your book online.

A WordPress theme for a question-answers site

Ever wanted to have an answers site but didn’t know how to get the features you need or make it look awesome? Here’s the AskIt theme from Elegant Themes. You can easily pick from among the seven unique color schemes it comes with, and visitors can vote answers up or down. The question author can select a correct answer too. A nice form for sign-up is presented to new users instead of the default WordPress registration, so you’re not as likely to scare new questioners away.

AskIt Theme

It’s getting easier and easier to set up really awesome sites lightning fast, thanks to all the wonderful themes out there. If you know of any more cool ones, please do let me know!

In late January, I saw a tweet from @zoho mentioning a promotion for the Chrome Notebook Pilot Program. Some people using Zoho apps through the Chrome web browser would see a special link to apply for the promotion. It took me a few different tries, but finally I saw such a link and applied to get my hands on a Cr-48. I knew I was a great candidate for one, since I do most of my documents online (using Google Apps or Zoho), keep my second brain in the cloud (Zoho Notebook and Evernote), and shop, bank, tweet, IM, and email online too. But I never got an email back from Google saying that I’d be one of the lucky ones.

Two and a half weeks later though, a plain brown box showed up on my front steps. Once I saw the decorated inner box, I started to get excited…could this be a Chrome notebook?

Turns out it was a Cr-48, and I happily unboxed it and opened it up. The Chrome operating system booted up in just a few seconds, and then I connected to my wireless network and was asked to go through a quick setup, where I signed in with my Google account and allowed the notebook to take a quick picture of me. Google wants me to use that user account only for my own use, so they can log how I use the device and any comments I report. Sending the logs when I send feedback is totally voluntary, but I do so, because I really appreciate this opportunity! I’m free to create additional user accounts for regular users or there’s a handy Guest account that can be used as quickly as it takes for the guest to hit .

I agreed to use this as my regular computer and to send feedback to Google (through a handy icon at the top of my screen) often, and believe me, I do so with great pleasure.  When the notebook is powered on, the Chrome OS starts up lightning fast and the Chrome browser is automatically opened. Life exists in that browser, pretty much. There’s no desktop, no apps installed on the hard drive, none of the slow or heavy stuff we’re accustomed to. In fact, Chrome automatically updates itself from the web if updates are available.

The Cr-48 is just the right size for balancing lightly on my knees on the couch or curling up with it pretty much anywhere. And I certainly don’t miss waiting for Windows Vista to boot up and get logged in! There’s no Caps Lock key or function keys (F1-F12) on this keyboard, but instead there’s a key that opens up a new tab in the Chrome browser.  If you want to, you can get to a command line to talk to the notebook with Linux commands, or you can browse the file system as the user Chronos, but so far I’ve only done that once, to see what was there.

The Chrome notebook has been wonderful. A few days ago I created a new niche site, and that included exporting my Thesis settings out of this blog and then importing into the new site so that I wouldn’t have to insert the custom code for the header look or worry about the colors for the other areas.  The little notebook handled that task just fine, sending downloads into my Downloads folder (always accessible by Ctrl-o) and automatically retrieving the Downloads folder when it was time to upload the file into the new site’s Thesis settings.

I’m not usually one to print a lot, but when I did have to produce a paper document I was able to do that easily using Google Cloud Printing. Essentially I just had to sign into Google on my old desktop PC and activate the Google Cloud Print connector in the Google Chrome browser. Now the local printers for that PC are available to the notebook.

How can you get a Cr-48? There’s a questionnaire at the site of the Chrome Notebook Pilot Program, and it will ask you various questions to determine if you’re a good fit for the program.  Essentially you do need to be ready and willing to live on the web. The Cr-48 is not for you if your heart is fond of spinning hard drives, Windows Vista bugs, or installed applications, but if you like to be able to work online independent of what computer you’re on, you’ll love this Chrome notebook!

Sometimes in the last couple of years, especially after starting some of my early sites, I’d think something like this: Well I’ve written 10-20 posts, I’ve commented on ten different blogs, and I’ve joined a few forums and put my link in my signature. But still no one’s reading this blog! How do I know when to stop wasting my time?

Einstein once gave us a quick definition of insanity as doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. So why would someone fail in blogging, sometimes for quite a long time, yet think it makes any sense at all to just keep at it, expecting better results the next time?

When Leigh Peele first started a blog to share her knowledge and successes with physical fitness and fat loss, only a few people read it. Then she wrote a book, and it only sold SIX COPIES. At that point, why wouldn’t she realize she was banging her head on a concrete wall and give up? I know I would have! But she didn’t give up. She started networking with others and putting a little more into it, so soon her blog had 100-200 readers a day, and $20 a month in blog income. At that point, if it were me I’d “realize” I had a nice little hobby and stop wasting my time, but it’s a good thing she didn’t ask for my opinion! Eventually she found herself making thousands per month from the blog itself and now has a successful paid membership site, plenty of clients, as well as successful ebooks. It “just” took time and a lot of hard work.

A few months ago I looked at Chris Brogan’s archives and was surprised to see that his posts from 2004 and 2005 have no comments, at least from the original time period! Now, it may be that he moved his blog from one platform to another and the comments were lost in the process, but look at this post about comment envy from 2006, TWO FULL YEARS after the first post in the archives. Why didn’t Chris “realize” he should give up? I can’t imagine blogging for that long without getting any positive reinforcement. Why did he keep plugging away? Fortunately he just kept working, and over many years he became an “overnight success.”

Pat Flynn almost gave up on his blog, because although he was writing awesome content, he had almost no traffic. But an influential blogger wrote a post about him and his blog, and suddenly he had a huge amount of traffic flowing to his blog. And of course once all those people came to his blog, we stayed with him and want to read every word he writes because his blog has really amazing, useful information. And Pat has never had to get another job working for someone else again.

I love reading stories like those. But I also see blogs all the time that someone should have put out of their misery long ago. So how can we tell the difference? How do we know when to keep at it and when to stop? Or a “sub-question” of that would be, how do we know when our topic stinks and it’s time to ditch one blog and start another one?

The best answer I can figure out for now is the over-simplified statement that there are no guarantees in life. We can devote all of our time and money to a business, cause, or relationship, and still find later that it was all in vain and our efforts didn’t get the results we wanted. Or we can do the same thing and have a story with a happy ending and a success. The main thing is that if we make all the sacrifices and exert all that effort it should be for something that we totally believe in. It should be a project so compelling that we almost can’t keep ourselves from working on it, and that’s going to get us through all those hard days and sacrifices we make in the beginning.

I’ve started too many sites to remember at this point, but I’ve finally found a niche I know is right for me because it’s what I bore my family and friends with all that time, any time they’ll listen, and it’s been that way for 15 years. But I also know it’s going to be a long haul, and I’m enjoying every step. So if we’re ever looking at our dismal Adsense reports or analytics in the early days of new blogs, we must remember to have a look at Chris Brogan’s first post in his archives and realize that it may be that we just have a few years of hard work ahead!

Photo credit: craigfinlay