Starting Over

I've gotten wiped out exactly 3 times before, and I remember exactly where I was, what I was doing, and how I felt each time. It's a feeling that does not soon leave you.

My entire gameplan for the past 12 months has been making sure I never get wiped out again. So far, so good.
 


Love the references to The Black Swan in this thread. That and Antifragile changed my way of thinking.

The plans, projects and skillsets me and my biz partner are focused on in 2014 are "antifragile" ones, instead of those exposed to black swans.

SEO or being an affiliate may be an awesome starting point, but you have to eventually step back and start building a real business of your own. Otherwise you're just a turkey waiting to be beheaded.
 
I've been there, more times than I am brave enough to admit. Fortunately I have bounced back stronger each time, and with more experience. The most important aspect of success or building success are your connections. If it were not for my friends when I was in dire need of help, I would have never gotten back on my feet. I am thankful that I have great friends in the industry that look out for each other, and are there to offer a helping hand when one of us are on the brick of poverty.

I have done my fair share of helping old friends get back on their feed, and I have received the same treatment when I needed help. I am not sure how large your business circle might be, or how close you are with your friends, but the best thing you can do is cuddle up to them. It might be time to swallow your dignity and sinceriously ask for their help. When you are finally solvent, make sure you pay it forward.
 
Veritas said:
I still remember to this day, few years ago, I went to my atm machine about to go out to a bar with a hommie of mine, when it was Washington Mutual, put my atm card, withdrew 40.00, I got a over withdrawal charge for 35.00 or some shit like that, I looked at the receipt, it was at negative 40.00, I stood there frozen, and I thought how much I owe on my CC, which was around 10,000.00, that was enough for me. I became the biggest penny pincher on the planet, even when I went on dates, she paid
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I have been there. I just like you remember that day vividly. I was at a ATM in a pizzeria with my girlfriend. I decided to check my balance and it was around $30. On top of this, I had about $15k in CC debt and had tuition to pay for in a month. This was probably the first time that my girlfriend was actually wealthier than me, hah..which is a lot to say considering we have been together for 8 years. I obviously felt extremely depressed during this time but the best thing I did was make a few calls to a couple friends and explained my situation. Half a year later I was at six figures again. That is the brilliance of this industry, you can go from zero to hero very quickly.
 
Louey37 said:
Can we sticky this thread? Maybe somewhere in the newbies area or just somewhere?

I know that next time I get wiped out, I'm really going to appreciate reading this.
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Wait, the next time you get wiped out?

WUT?

WHY NEXT TIME BRO BRO?
 
Island said:
Love the references to The Black Swan in this thread. That and Antifragile changed my way of thinking.

The plans, projects and skillsets me and my biz partner are focused on in 2014 are "antifragile" ones, instead of those exposed to black swans.

SEO or being an affiliate may be an awesome starting point, but you have to eventually step back and start building a real business of your own. Otherwise you're just a turkey waiting to be beheaded.
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Yes.
I believe it was Eli (correct me?) who said something of the lines of
"Use grey hat to get to the top, and white hat to stay there".

This doesn't have to be strictly SEO speak. "Slingin berries" or whatever else in order to have the resources to build something bigger and better and more legit has worked well for me, and a lot of others that I know.

.
 
mGrunin said:
The most important aspect of success or building success are your connections
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This is often overlooked in discussions like these but it's such an important part of the success of so many people, myself included. On a personal level do as mGrunin suggests... help those closest to you when you are in a position to do so, pay it forward when you have it good and hopefully they'll do the same if you ever need it.

You can't really do that on a professional level but know that the best time to make connections is when you're successful. Get involved in some little JVs with big established businesses in your niche as an affiliate or partner to acquire some good will because that option just won't be available to you when you're down.

And, pay it forward by investing a little time and/or money in a couple of smaller businesses and help them to grow. Don't get too involved and don't ask for a lot in return but little financial support and/or guidance can go a long way. This business might be on the way up when yours is on the way down.

If your main business takes a hit, you'll have options available to you... get more involved in the JVs in order to raise enough capital to get yourself set-up again or get more involved in the smaller firm and grow that into something bigger and better. I chose to do the latter in 2009 and haven't looked back since
 
I'm busy hustling the writing gig and working at building a couple of new businesses. My damn teeth hurt because I need several root canals, and I'm tight-wadding to keep the lights on and the leads flowing my way.

While parking my car the other day at Walmart (I just said I'm cheap) I saw a man who looked like he could have been a boardroom executive. He was the right age and just had that look. What was he doing? Wearing a blue smock, and gathering shopping carts for the store. Pay couldn't have been more than $8 an hour. And it was cold.

This made me feel a bit sorry for him and grateful for what I have. Like the rest of you, I have a skill set and knowledge base that I can use to prosper. There is nothing out there, bros. The situation is dire, even for those with advanced degrees.

If your sites got hit, build on the knowledge you've attained and go onto bigger and better things. We're in the right place at the right time. All it takes is effort and focus to move forward.
 
I don't know, i feel as if i'm constantly rebuilding. I personally like that attitude. Perhaps i'm just paranoid. Or unlucky? Or a complete idiot? You decide...
Still, things are changing fast and how can you feel secure if you are falling behind the curve ...?
 
I wasted an entire year feeling sorry for myself and mourning a death in my family.

All I did was smoke herb, maintain some dead-beat wordpress websites and dick around online "learning." I have a dead-end food service job that's been holding me above water and than some.

No real assets, no debt, minor health inconveniences, zero savings (bullshit herb isn't addictive)

2014 - Getting ready to incorporate, building two "big brand" websites. Fuck poverty.
 
Before you read this
What I say here is not ultimate ultimate truth. It is just one way of looking at things. I might myself not agree with it tmrw. It took me many 5-digit days and thousands of hrs of maximizing profit to come to this understanding.

Whatever you build will eventually be destroyed. The way this universe works everything (only everything you see) is bound to first be created, then be maintained for a time and then destroyed. So you cannot find security in the realm of the changeful.

Mantra "maximize profit" is not the ultimate one. Belief "I will be happy if I have $X amount of money" or "I will be content if I have $X coming per day/month/year/lifetime" is a very weak and the ones who have achieved all of their imaginable and unimaginable money targets are still left ultimately unsatisfied.

So what to do? You have to go deeper. What does it mean? You can easily confirm for yourself internally, that the measure-stick of success should be your own sense of contentment and not quantity of dollars accumulated (or amount of sex you get or even the amount of social validation you get from your peers, relatives, friends). Although these two might be closely related for you now, ultimately they are not the same.

What is contentment? You can say it is peace of mind. When mind is at peace, the body comes to peace too, meaning it becomes lighter and tensions gradually go away. Is peace of mind a dead place of inactivity? It is not a stale place, it is the most alive and joyful you can be. It can be a very dynamic place of action and interaction with others.

Each and every one of you has sufficient capacity in the body and in the mind to come to peace and contentment right now or any moment. No external circumstances are required. Does it mean we all live in caves? No, you can still make money. You can go to cave too, if you want. There are no rules on how you lead your life. =)

I know fears arise that you won't be able to make money and what not. But this is not true. When you act from a place of contentment quality of your work increases. The deeper peace you attain the higher quality your action will take.

Obviously, this doesn't happen over night for most ppl, but it can. You can begin by regularly questioning your beliefs and assumptions. You can start with easy ones and move to the ones you hold dear. You might notice how your actions are governed by some beliefs. One can be "maximize profit". So most conversations you make, most thoughts you have are have underlying thought in the background "make as much money as possible". The thoughts might be negative and might be positive, but it's all the same. You are like a robot with outdated software. Your vision is very narrow, which means you are getting a skewed picture of reality.

tl dr version: The measurestick of success should be your own sense of contentment and not dollar amount.
 
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so most of you are SEO guys. is there many out there still buying paid traffic and sending to offers? doesn't seem that many

CPA affiliate marketing really is kinda dead IMO. of course you still have the sharasale and CJ stuff but that's not what i mean.
 
Losing it all and starting over? Hell yeah. 3 or 4 times now.
Welcome to the internet. Sometimes you'll be just a bit to far behind the curve and lose it.
Fuck it. Find the next thing and move forward. Learn to look at your old efforts as a timesuck and a relic preventing you from really looking at new opportunities(it's the truth most of the time) and do it all again.
I've mailed, done SEO, PPC, and landed where I am now. All of them(overall) were successful.
But while mailing I got ripped over for [almost] everything I had more than once. SEO I had entire site networks with hundreds or thousands of domains bite the dust overnight. PPC I had campaigns fail and fail hard.

Restarting and rebuilding is what we do. We're internet entrepreneurs: It's like traditional business, but 10x as fast. What happens once in 30 years to someone else will happen every few years to us. Them's the ropes.
 
harrymouni said:
so most of you are SEO guys. is there many out there still buying paid traffic and sending to offers? doesn't seem that many

CPA affiliate marketing really is kinda dead IMO. of course you still have the sharasale and CJ stuff but that's not what i mean.
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Bitch please. The only people who are dead are the people who never learned how to do anything other than push a flog and a farticle.
Pre-WuYi Tea affiliates, represent!
 
well are you still buying traffic and pushing to offers xmcp? i don't know many that are, apart from adult dating and other offers on adult traffic
 
When it comes to what motivates you to keep going or to rebuild, most people are motivated by fear, but I believe there is a minority that responds to fear (worry) the opposite way. I would consider myself in that minority. If you worry about the problem, you shut down and nothing gets done. Things get worse, even as everyone around you is telling you how bad things are and begging you to fix it.

For those who shut down in a crisis, its not because they can't handle it. We're wired differently. We need to focus on the solution to a problem and actively work to solve it, not talk about it or listen to someone explain again how everything is falling apart. For us every crisis is like losing control of a car on an icy road, if you obsess about not hitting the tree, you hit the tree. If you focus on where you need to be going, you regain control. If we obsess over the problems, we only see the problems. If we obsess over finding a solution, we retain our creativity and we find solutions.
 
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