Unfortunately, that rarely works.

I have no idea what the final product is going to look like. I don’t know what my readers are going to actually want. I think I can guess, but I can’t read their minds.

If I hold onto the process loosely and don’t worry about getting it right from the very beginning, then I won’t be disappointed.

My main goal is to do something. I’m not going to wait for perfection. I’ll settle for good enough for now.

It’s just really nice when the lunch happens to be free.

Blog Development From The Ground Up

I have always wanted to see, in real time, the progress of a blog project from start to finish.

So many of the Internet prophets and gurus spend lots of time talking about how easy it is to start a blog or niche site and be able to monetize it. They tout the benefits of passive income and get others (and me) to buy into their ideas and rhetoric.

But I am a skeptical person, and seeing is always better than believing.

Enter The Million Dollar Blog Project

A couple weeks ago, I came across Think Traffic’s, Million Dollar Blog Project—and I rejoiced.

Because, for the first time, someone, namely Corbett Barr, has decided to show, step-by-step, how to create, grow, and capitalize on a blog that is not about blogging. (BTW, that’s the most commas I’ve ever used in one sentence).

And, not only is he going to show how it’s done, he’s invited ANYONE to do the same thing with him—in real time—and share in the experience.

No charge. No program to buy. No subscription to maintain. Noting for $97 bucks. Just shared experience.

How could I say no?

Progress Journal

One of the “rules” of the Million Dollar Blog Project (by the way, I am unashamedly trying to see if I can rank in the top 5 for the keyword ‘Million Dollar Blog Project’, just to see if I can improve my SEO skills—sorry Corbett)… as I was saying, one of the “rules” is to keep a personal journal and document my progress in developing an income generating sight.

I have had No More Dollars For Hours for a while now to do just that. So, I thought, what better place to keep my journal.

If you are actually reading this site, you’ll see other posts about other influential folks that I have been listening to and consider mentors from afar.

I hope you enjoy getting to know them as well.

I KNOW there are tons of systems out there that tell you just what to do and have you use their templates. I think those are great, but for some reason I have a hard time putting myself into those frameworks. (I should probably figure out why that is). I don’t want to reinvent the wheel here, just find a system that works for me. So here’s what I’ve come up with up to this point.

Domain & Hosting

This is the easiest part of the process for me. I always try to get a domain name that contains the strongest key word possible. I register this domain and set up hosting on Blue Host in a matter of a few minutes. I currently own about a dozen domains so I’ve been-there-done-that before.

Keyword Research

Again, this is something that comes pretty easy. I use Market Samurai to make this as fast and painless as possible. The keyword research for this niche was done several weeks ago so I don’t have to waste time doing that again.

Planning Out The Posts

Next, I took all those keywords and went into WordPress and created a whole bunch of drafts, one draft for each keyword. In each draft I put the keyword into my title field, tag field, and key word field under the SEO package then hit save draft. Now, when I need to add another key word article I just have to open up WordPress, pick the next draft, do some quick research and put together a 500+ word article and post it.

Reworking The Article

Lastly, I’m going to take the article I’m publishing on my niche site and reformat it so I can use it on eZine.com and start creating some backlinks to the site in order for Google to love me and start ranking me higher.

Forums

Next, I’m going to start finding quality forums for my niche and start getting active in those sites.

I’ve integrated my normal 9-5 job with Facebook, sharing status updates and active links to current blog postings. I’ve increased the traffic to my personal web site by 300% which is pretty good, but not great since I had REALLY small numbers to begin with. But growth is growth and I have to start somewhere.

I’ve found out that I really like Twitter and I’ve also been tweeting links to my blog as well. I’m wanting to make that a little more personal but also professional but I haven’t quite found a good balance there.

I bought a Kodak Zi10 video camera for making HD videos as well as two good dynamic microphones, a small sound board, and all the cords that go along with that stuff so I can make some good quality podcasts. I’ve been recording all of my speaking engagements and posting them as podcasts as well. I really like podcasting and hope to do much more of it.

I still don’t feel like I’ve found my voice quite yet. I’m not sure who I’m talking to and I’m having a hard time just being me, whether that’s in front of a microphone or typing on my blog. But I’m sure I’ll find it soon. I’m very comfortable speaking in front of large groups and I enjoy it a lot. I’m still trying to find that comfort in other mediums.

The last 60 days or so have been a little weird when it comes to online learning stuff. I steppe away from reading most of my normal blogs. I didn’t do much active learning or even trying stuff. Instead, I’ve been developing what I already have to see if I can actually do some of that. It is a HUGE mental shift for me and now it feels like it has become much more comfortable. I noticing that I am getting the itch again to actually DO something online, not just learn about online stuff. Can’t wait to see what happens.

We got hit with some pretty hard news lately so I think I’m going to write a post later today called A $10,000 Bill Is Excellent Motivation To Make Online Income Successful. Be watching for it.

I forgot to write posts.

Now, I didn’t really FORGET. I just got too busy with the other 42 other emergencies in my life and blogging got pushed to the back burner. All of these emergencies are the same “emergencies” I deal with on a weekly basis, they just seemed to distract me a little more these past few weeks.

Finding The Fire In My Belly

For some reason, the “passion” or sense of urgency has disapatted as of late. I’m not sure why. Now, instead of everything feeling all exciting and new, the shinnyness has worn off and now its more like hard work. And hard work isn’t nearly as fun as exciting and new. But work I must.

Here’s What I Need To Do

• I need to get some article created so I can drive some SEO juice to my audio book site. (It is for a VERY specific niche but for those who are interested in it, here it is www.CounselingStories.com)
• I need to figure out what topics I want to start creating content for on another project www.OvercomingFearOfFailure.com
• I need to regularly post new podcast episodes for my current job.

I’m going to stick with just those three things before trying to tackle anything else. I’ll let you know how it goes.

DIY vs. VA’s

One of the things that has held me back (so I think) is my propensity to want to do everything myself. I don’t really think I’m a control freak but maybe I am. I just want things to look just so and be just right and apparently, I’m the only person in the universe that can make that happen.

In reality, what I think is happening is the need for me to wrestle with each step of the process and learn how things work from the inside out. I’ve always been that kid that took apart stuff because I wanted to learn how it worked. I’ve never taken a formal class for anything technology related but I think I have a decent working knowledge of lots of techies stuff. Yeah, its taken me 10 times as long to learn it, but for me, I think I need to take that journey. Its how I learn best.

It was reassuring to hear that Pat also took way too much time figuring out how all this stuff worked out as well. Its nice to see that great minds think alike. Thanks Pat.

His best advice for people getting started on YouTube—Get involved in the community!

I am questioning whether I have the capacity to do this type of business. Am I trying to be something that is just not me? Other people can do it but it is not my personality. It is not my natural bent. It is not who I am and so I will never be good at it.

I believe people are wired to be really good at only a limited amount of things. No one can be great at everything. I accept that. I have found something in my day job that I truly believe I am naturally gifted in. I believe I do it better than most. But, unfortunately, it is in an industry that is non-scalable. I won’t be able to make any passive income from this industry. It’s like a brain surgeon trying to create passive income out of his skilled hands. He sort of has to be there to actually DO the brain surgery. He can’t phone that it. He has to be there and so is limited in his income potential. Welcome to my world.

I didn’t think it was possible, but someone has figured out how to breathe new life into the most basic of office tools—the rubber band.

I have 4 kids, two of which are still in elementary school. Lately, they have been coming home with these new things called Silly Bandz. They are animal shaped  (or car shaped, or super hero shaped, or whatever-you-can-imagine-shaped) rubber bands that act like regular rubber bands when stretched, but return to their cool new shape when not in use.

I admit, I think they’re pretty cool. They are one of those “Dang, I wish I would have thought of that” type of cool thing for me. But I’ve noticed they have become much more than just funny shaped rubber bands for my children.

The New Social Currency

When kids are in school, they need things in common with other kids that will help build friendships and create community. My older kids used Poke´mon cards. Older generations traded baseball cards. All of these things are used to build connections to other people through a common task or shared experience.

Silly Bandz are not just rubber bands anymore. They are being traded like currency on the Stock Exchange. “I’ll give you two elephants and a palm tree for your Superman logo.” Kids are working hard to be THAT kid who has the most Silly Bandz, or the coolest Silly Bandz, or the go-to guy who is the distributor of all things Silly Bandz.

What I Have Learned From Silly Bandz

As a newbie to Internet Business I am looking for that Uber-special thing that will work for me. I want it to be life-changing and perfect. I want it to be special. I want it to say something about me. But I’m having a hard time finding just what that thing is.

Now, here comes some guy and he says, “Hey, rubber bands are boring. I think I’ll do something different with the most basic of things” and he starts a new social revolution among kids and adolescents.

I’m going to stop looking for the magic bullet and see how I can improve my everyday life with the things that I have. Now, just how do I open my eyes to see differently?

Photo by Teddy Started It

Enter The Dragon

A quick and easy solution is Dragon Dictation by Nuance Software. Dragon Dictation is a speech-to-text app for my iPhone that lets me say what I’m thinking and then email myself the text version of the message.

How To Write Articles In Under 5 Minutes

In order to write original articles for the specific keyword that I’m targeting, I simply jump on the Internet and look up my keyword. I visit the prominent sites that come up to see what content they might have. If anything looks valuable, I pull the two or three main points from the article and then dictate a quick summary of the information in my own words using Dragon Dictation. Its that easy.

One glitch I found with the software is the tendency for it to hang up when the transcript gets too long. To solve this, I usually go paragraph by paragraph with pauses in between. I actually found this to be helpful since it allowed me to organize my thoughts for the next paragraph.

Once I’m done with the dictation, I simply email the transcript to myself, edit it by adding the correct punctuation, include a few extra details, and I have a new and original article.

Just prior to this posting, I was able to write, edit, and post 3 complete articles on my keyword in just half an hour. Give it a try and let me know how well it works for you.