from $0 to $1500 per month in 9 months…up next $10k+ per month…
Posted by Max Davis as Reader Discussion, Reader Questions, Site News
Typically I don’t write blog posts on weekends, but I’m trying to continue my “great first impression” since I’m still new in town. Don’t get used to this 7 days a week stuff : -)
I was thinking a lot about what kinds of things I’m going to discuss on this blog over the next few months. I have about 7,000 articles floating around in my head, so there is no lack of content here. It’s more an issue of narrowing down all these thoughts into the most valuable things I can discuss.
Then I realized the most obvious way to focus my efforts is to just ask you what you want to read more about. Earth shattering breakthrough I know!
So, I found this handy dandy WP-Poll plugin a little while ago, fumbled around with it a bit and it just wasn’t working right. I’m sure it was user error on my end, but I never got it right. So, I’m using a free polling script from polldaddy.com instead (even though that website sounds like an “adult entertainment” company).
Go ahead and place your vote for your favorite topic of interest…
(Note, you can check up to 5 boxes below if you can’t decide on your favorite)
To thank you for your time, I’ll randomly pick one of the comments below and send that person $25 via paypal. Be sure to use your paypal email address when leaving the comment in case you win so you can get your cash.
(BS comments like “Thanks” or “Nice post” won’t be part of the drawing, sorry. Drawing will be done via recorded video so it’s 100% fair using this random drawing program to pick the winning comment number).
I’ll pick a winner on Monday evening (March 31) around 8pm est, so make sure you leave your comment right away…
Thanks for your help!
41 Responses
Bill
March 29th, 2008 at 1:52 pm
1I’d like to read more about buying and selling websites and developing websites from the ground up.
I just hope that you continue the “dare to be different” mentality that you are exhibiting so far. The world is full of crappy pay per post blogs or poorly done affiliate pumps.
@Max - Maybe you could choose a niche and develop the site and then do a summary once it’s completed so they won’t be able to copy you.
Erik Karey
March 29th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
2I’d like to see more of website monetization techniques in the form of a case study or perhaps a complete case study that we can follow with you as you build a site from nothing to one that is generating revenue even if it’s just a little revenue. It would be great to see it cover traffic building, search engine optimization and then monetization.
Patrick
March 29th, 2008 at 1:56 pm
31. How to get more traffic to your website
Traffic is King and is the one requirement for Internet Survival. In the Blog world. Traffic brings opinions, insight, experience, collabaration, ideas, and most of all Money!
2. Watch and learn - how to videos
Well humans communicate ideally face to face and can relate with each other more comfortably. Look how Youtube took off. People love to look at……..people.
3. MP3 audio lessons / podcasts
I would love to kill my 45 min commute to work and back listening to podcast that would motivate me not to sit on my ars when I got home.
4. Pay per click advertising tips
The only success I have found on the internet is pay-per-click. So for me personally I am interested in growing my income with this method.
5. Contests with good prizes
THE CHANCE TO WIN SOMETHING FOR NOTHING. That says it all.
Lane
March 29th, 2008 at 2:34 pm
4Hi Max,
As I mentioned in my comments from your first post, I really NEED to start monetizing my site. You had mentioned Clickbank’s affiliate network. Thanks again for that. I will look into that.
In the “make money online” world, people often comment that it’s important to use a custom theme for WP sites so that your site stands out more and has a unique identity. I’ve been using a pretty standard, but clean and simple theme. I was thinking about staying with it as I feel my site stands up well on its content. However, I agree with your points that I am wasting an awful lot of screen real estate on titles. I need to figure out how to minimize the titles. If you have any suggestions regarding theme use, I’d appreciate your input.
Also, regarding buying and selling websites, I have quite a few DNs that I have parked. They don’t get all that much traffic and thus, not a lot of revenue. I feel that I need to create minisites for theses DNs and try and monetize them myself or perhaps just sell them.
Thanks for your comments and posts. I’m liking what I’m hearing from you thus far.
Lane of VeganBits.com
Dusty
March 29th, 2008 at 2:43 pm
5I would really like to watch you develop and grow a website from scratch. Bloggers always talk about this but then they leave out all of the things beginners truly do not know about. They posts random things like “so after a bit of SEO work”, etc. Blah, Blah, Blah! What does that really mean!
It would be nice to see you pick something, promote it, and describe everything along the way, and then show us how much you made.
cuzzy
March 29th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
6Since reading your first post the whole notion of the buying of a blog really peaked my interest.
So for sure that would be something I would love to read about.
The Affiliate marketing and SEO are the other two that I am always trying to learn more about.
And of course who could refuse a review of my blog from a pro like yourself. Yes I have thick skin and love to take other’s thoughts and learn.
oh and winning money is fun.
I am very much looking forward to reading more on this site.
thanks so much Max.
Max
March 29th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
7Great comments everyone…
@ Bill - I’m probably “different” because I don’t really read a lot of blogs in this make money market. Probably a good lesson for any niche, not knowing what other people are saying keeps you from copying their ideas. I just write based on my own previous experience, not what someone else has said before.
Looks like buying and selling websites is a pretty hot topic so far. Luckily that’s my specialty! Followed closely by starting a new site from scratch. Hmm, how about starting a new site from scratch and then selling that site? Might be on to something…
I think the main issue with this starting a new site concept is unethical copycats. If you have 1000 people watching you, there is a good chance quite a few are going to copy your exact niche, your exact ads, articles, etc, which will ultimately make it more difficult to be successful with the project.
So far just 6 comments, you each have a 16% chance of winning $25 right now!
(btw - If my comment # is drawn from the random drawing, I’ll just draw a new number from the hat until I get a winner.)
Solo Programmer
March 29th, 2008 at 3:21 pm
8I guess it falls under how to get more traffic but I’d love to see a case study with real concrete techniques for promoting a site. Real details not generalities like “article promotion” and “PPC”. I’d love to see this done for new sites and semi-established ones, blogs, other content sites and e-commerce. And how the techniques change/vary based on the current state of the site and the niche.
And the others I’m interested in being buying/selling sites and starting a site from day one.
Emma
March 29th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
9I like SEO, keyword research, and affiliate marketing tips. I also enjoy good videos and inspirational success stories. The poll was a good idea. Good luck with your site.
Mike Huang
March 29th, 2008 at 5:11 pm
10I chose 5 of the choices, but I think the most important topic is “MOTIVATION CASE STUDIES”. Bloggers need to be motivated because every blogger now thinks he/she should make a quick buck. With motivational case studies, it will allow bloggers to realize what the correct way is to be successful. Motivating bloggers with other success stories is also a plus
-Mike
NBWeb.it
March 29th, 2008 at 5:59 pm
11Hi Max.
for me the most important topic at my point would be: how to monetize better my website.
I would ask you to put attention also to international markets, because my blogs are in italian language, and i think there is a market here pretty unexplored……
- Nicola
Valery
March 29th, 2008 at 8:11 pm
12I am just starting out with internet marketing and selling information products outside of the “how to make money” online. Since I’m just getting ready to launch my first website I would love to see you launch and start driving traffic to a new site.
I’m also in the process of launching a companiion e-zine, so I’m very interested in the topics of email marketing and getting subscribers.
Of course, I’m also interested in the “standard” topics of how to drive traffic to a site and how to monetize a site.
Looking forward to seeing some new content here; it’ already seems like it will be a breath of fresh air in a saturated market.
Terry Tay
March 29th, 2008 at 8:53 pm
13First off, with regards to not getting used to the 7 days a week stuff…If you can’t write on weekends why not use the timestamp to compile some articles that will automatically appear over the weekend or on days that you don’t have enough time to sit down and write. You can knock of a few articles during the week that you can just edit the time stamp so the article will appear on Saturday or Sunday or any day that you are busy.
With regards to your poll…I wanted to actually check off more than just 5. All of them are great topics save for the lunch one
You have said you buy and sell websites so I checked that one for sure because you would be very knowledgable in that. So, perhaps you can go that route and post topics you are the most knowledgable in.
~Terry
The CL Experiment
March 29th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
14Hi Max..looking forward to seeing how things unfold. As a newbie blogger I am most interested in a “walkthrough” if you will of monetizing, gaining readership, optimizing search engines and driving traffic. I have found so far that some things must come before others to build a good foundation but I am learning the hard way.
Ryan
March 29th, 2008 at 9:05 pm
15Max,
I’m excited to see where this blog goes in the coming months! I think Ben was doing a fine job and it sounds like you’re ready to take things to the next level.
As far as I’m concerned, I’m a new blogger and I’m really interested in ways to drive traffic to my site and make some money at it along the way. My site is a niche sports site specific to one university, so I know my audience is probably limited. I’m using this as a learning tool to get some experience and am planning to start another site at some other point to really make a go of making some cash.
I look forward to seeing the continued growth here at BloggingExperiment.com.
Anastasia
March 29th, 2008 at 10:11 pm
16Contests! I found your site because of this contest
Contests are a great way to get some traffic AND attract new readers as well as keeping readers loayal 
GreenLantern
March 29th, 2008 at 10:14 pm
17I would like to see more posts about buying and selling websites. It is something that I have heard a lot about, but haven’t really read a lot about how to do it. From what I understand there are several different methods, techniques, and/or ways to do it. I would also like it if these articles were aimed absolute beginners.
Another thing I would like to see would be personal success stories. I want to read about how people have grown their blogs, the techniques they have used, what costs they incurred along the way, what did work, what didn’t work, etc.
Sean Hackbarth
March 30th, 2008 at 12:57 am
18I’m interested in figuring out how to build readership and get them to subscribe to my RSS feed.
Jason
March 30th, 2008 at 1:31 am
19Monetization tips FTW. Affiliate marketing (how to get started), how to develop websites until they’re worth five figures (as you mentioned you’ve done before) - reviews of other blogs that your readers run (*cough*) would be great too
Ron
March 30th, 2008 at 1:34 am
20You are off to a great start, take over a blog and instead of guessing what people want to read about, just ask… like you said common sense marketing… I like that you are, doing what you are teaching.. its nice to read it and see it
thanks
Pat
March 30th, 2008 at 2:38 am
21I’d like to see more about the 125×125 ad. I know it’s the latest, but where do you start, how do these work, where can you get them? I’ve looked around for good, beginner 125×125 ad content, but I can’t seem to find anything thats plain and simple.
Caroline Middlebrook
March 30th, 2008 at 4:32 am
22Hi Max,
I’ve voted for watching you build a site from scratch and also for traffic and monetization advice. I like to see people who can put their money where their mouth is and demonstrate what they know. I use a project based approach on my blog where I try something out and blog about the progress. It would be great to see you do something similar with a new site and sharing your experiences along the way.
Btw, many decent blogs have been sold to new owners in the last 6 months and I have unsubscribed from every single one as a result. This is the first that I’ve wanted to stay subscribed to. At last somebody with a fresh perspective who is not afraid to be different - I like you already
Merlene
March 30th, 2008 at 8:19 am
23Max, you seem to have some exciting plans for the site. I’m really looking forward to watching how the site evolves from here. It was difficult to pick only 5 in the poll - I want to know more about ALL of it.
As someone who’s hoping to build a site from scratch and monetize it to the point of making 5 figures (or more) over the coming months I’m excited to see what you have in store for us.
Celeste
March 30th, 2008 at 11:55 am
24Hi, I enjoy reading about all of the different aspects of websites and making money discussed here. I would like to see more complex tasks in a series of how to videos. It is always easier learning something when you see someone else doing something than just reading about it. The screenshots are helpful, but video is better.
I like what you are doing here, so keep up the good work!
thatedeguy
March 30th, 2008 at 1:21 pm
25Well, after your first post bragging… I mean describing… what good hands the blog is in, I’d love to see what you can do with a site. A step by step walk through of you turning a fresh site into a site worth thousands would certainly pique my interest. And can it be not a blog? I’ve seen way too many people talking about flipping blogs. I want to see a real site, with real products and real customers.
Tom Ross
March 30th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
26As an online entrepreneur (or rather designer and aspiring entrepreneur) I love to see real-life examples of how to buy/start a website and grow it to a successful level. Perhaps some personal casestudies of your past successes and a summary of how you achieved so much.
Simonne
March 30th, 2008 at 4:07 pm
27My vote goes for “mistakes to be avoided”, but I expect some different kind of articles than what other million bloggers write, re-think, re-phrase… I want to see the real thing: “do this mistake, and you’ll get these consequences”, preferably with proofs. It seems that most people who read this voted for tips to get more traffic and to better monetize their websites. In their rush, they go for anything that improves the Alexa ranking, but they forget the most important step of any business, be it offline or online, the research.
Darryl
March 30th, 2008 at 8:30 pm
28Glad to see some forward thinking. I have been an advent reader and found some of the articles were starting to lose its appeal and luster. For me design, content are great subjects for articles.
But to go a little further, I would like to create partnerships with other bloggers to form some kind of cross marketing media between bloggers where we can mutually benefit.
I know it could be my imagination or flights of fancy, but creating a mass online media like others have created but with many people involved and with a stake in the development could be what a goal of this site while providing income and knowledge to all who is apart of the project.
Louis Liem
March 30th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
29Hi, Max. I’d like to see articles about monetizing a blog. How’s your experiment on selling ad spaces on your blog, how we should offer ad spaces, when should we do that, where is the best placement according to your experience.
Another topic such as tips blog layouting would be great. How’s the good layout for human and also SE bots. What do you implement on this blog and how’s their result.
That’s what I say. Basically, I already like reading your posts anyway
Mark
March 30th, 2008 at 10:08 pm
30I think you should start and grow a new site from scratch.
I think it would really help us all learn from mistakes and about the entire process. Also, I think you should sell it to and help us learn about selling websites in the process too
By the way, My PayPal email is: edit by max (got it)
Jim Kirk
March 30th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
31I want to learn how to translate my passion and writing skills into money! I can read 101 writing books and tips, but I need info (real, not bloated BS) on how to make my time and effort pay off.
Thanks,
Jim
Sonny
March 30th, 2008 at 11:44 pm
32Max,
Buying, improving, and selling. Also starting from scratch would be great. I have a ton of great Ideas but no idea where to start. It would be nice to present it as if your were teaching a beginner.
Manuel
March 31st, 2008 at 8:14 am
33Hi Max,
just been a new born blogger, I subscribed to this blog trying to learn tips about how monetize my new hobby.
In order to do that, I´d like you to post specially about how to start a good site from scratch and about how to make contest online, since I think it could be a good point to enlarge my readers group.
Since I think giving cash prizes is the best way to offer interesting prizes, I´m quite interesting in how to organize it… and how to monetize my blog to get the cash I´d like to offer.
I´ve read you first posts in this blog and they have been interesting enough to follow the blog after you adcquisiton giving a fresh way to speak about the topics contained in it. Please go on with the way you have started to change blogging experiment.
Regards,
Andrea_R
March 31st, 2008 at 8:51 am
34More.
Just more. I can start a site and grow a site to a point, but I wanna see MORE of how to actually do what I need to do to improve it to make things skyrocket. I’ve read a few (dozen) blogs on how to make money online, but there seems to be a teeny bit not told. I don’t know what. What brings it up to the next level, bumping it up a notch?
And I’d really, REALLY love to see how to grow a site and flip it. I love starting new sites and I have a ton of ideas, I just know at some point I’d lose interest in maintaing soem of them and I’d want to move on to the next.
Beginner tutorials? Obviously, from my linked site, I don’t need ‘em.
Kevin
March 31st, 2008 at 11:49 am
35I’d like for you to talk about what you’re good at; buying and building websites and selling them for a nice profit.
If possible I’d like some information about taking an existing niche (with some power players already established) and carving out your own profits in that niche. I look forward to reading what you’ve got to say!
Boyd
March 31st, 2008 at 12:22 pm
36When buying a website, what items must be in place already for you to consider buying it? My guess would be some baseline level of traffic, maybe age of domain, # of pages.
I don’t think that you would care if there was any type of monetization going on already or not. If you know what you are doing, I imagine the monetization can be setup without too much hassle. And I imagine most sites that have good monetization models wouldn’t be the ones selling already.
To summarize my thoughts: what are the most important elements, that if already in place, make the flipping process much faster?
Jason Yormark
March 31st, 2008 at 2:18 pm
37Long time reader and lurker that is quite impressed with where the site is headed and the background of the new owner.
For me, the best value you could possibly bring to your readers is to have a series of posts around the complete evolution of buying/creating a site, making it successful, than selling it. There are thousands of articles floating around about how to do this and do that, but I really think a complete end to end journey would be a great way to give your readers a complete insight on how to pull it off.
Regardless, look forward to seeing how things pan out.
Max
March 31st, 2008 at 8:31 pm
38Winner of the contest has been randomly selected. You can watch the “live” drawing here on YouTube…
The payment has just been sent via Paypal.
Congrats.
Do you guys want more contests like these or are they a waste of time for you?
GreenLantern
March 31st, 2008 at 9:20 pm
39Hell ya! I’m a winner. Thanks a lot.
I think that contests like this are a great way to keep people around. Nobody is going to turn down the chance of winning money.
Terry Tay
March 31st, 2008 at 11:24 pm
40Sweet! Congrats GreenLantern!
Thanks for the contest Max! Of course people would love more contest like these!
~Terry
Step By Step Case Study Project
April 11th, 2008 at 12:50 pm
41[…] been thinking a lot about the survey I did a couple weeks ago. The basic feedback I received from everyone is they want to watch me […]
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