My 4 Hour Workweek

I felt like May was a productive month, even if the results don’t reflect it yet.  For whatever reason, I feel like I’ve been infused with new motivation, going so far as doing some backlinking for my InfoBarrel articles (which is something I haven’t done in a long time).

This month (June), I tried making a deal with myself to do at least 30 minutes of work per day during the week (obviously outside of my 9 to 5 job) which, sadly, is better than what I had been doing in the months prior.  I can usually spend a lot more time doing my “internet work” on the weekends, but it was always during the week where I struggled.

As I said, the results haven’t materialized yet, but I feel they’re on the way.  May was slightly better than April, and I really feel like I’m going to see some nice increases in the months to come.  Let’s dig into May…

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As I sit here laying the foundation for my authority website, I realize my plans cover almost everything: design, content, traffic, and monetization – four key elements to almost any successful money-generating website.   As critical as these elements may be, I still felt like I was missing something – my unique selling point/proposition (USP).

Great design and content provide a good reason to visit and revisit a website (in general), but what about when competition is fierce?  What about when you’re one of thousands within your niche?  Defining and properly executing your USP can be the difference between success and failure.

So I sit here and ask myself, “Why are people going to want to read and continue to visit my authority website?”  Before I pinpoint an exact answer, I thought I would brainstorm some potential types of USPs that can be applied to almost any business or website.  Pick your favorite(s) and run with it.

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Many of you will recall something I did for my newsletter subscribers back in December – I called it “newbie niche site month.”  Essentially, I sent weekly e-mails (for four weeks) to my subscribers with a short list of URLs that represented available exact match keyword domains for various types of products.  These were URLs that would potentially work well with Amazon niche sites.

The response I received was overwhelmingly positive. Although not everyone was able to actually register a domain, many enjoyed the emails because it gave them ideas for sites to build.  For those who don’t remember, I’ll recap the details…

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We spend a lot of our time focused on driving conversions on our niche sites: testing ad placements, building e-mail lists, strategically placing affiliate links, etc. Although some people make a lot of money doing this, results almost always fall below expectations.  You create a site, work hard at building backlinks, but are ultimately disappointed by the actual income earned.  Either our expectations are too high, or we simply aren’t working hard enough to reach those expectations.

That’s why when you’re hit with unexpected income, it’s really exciting, no matter how small the income.  I decided to share three short examples with you today from my own niche sites, where I’ve run into “unexpected” income.

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April may have been a pretty “status quo” month in terms of earnings, but I think there were a couple accomplishments (namely, the start of my authority website) that aren’t earning me anything right now, but could be very big sources of income in the future.

Although I’d love to sit here and tell you that I’m striving to quit my job in 6 months or make a million dollars in the next 2 years, I believe those things would create false hype.  Make no mistake, I will get there – it’s just not going to happen that quickly.  Realistically, I want to be the one to show you how it’s possible to earn decent money online while still keeping most of your focus on your “9 to 5″ career and your personal life.

We’d all love to earn a six-figure income from home, and it’s going to happen for some of us (and it’s a personal goal for me to do it eventually), but the majority of us are probably going to take a slow and steady approach to building up our online passive income.  It’s going to take time, and it’s going to require a lot of hard work, but we have the ability to be patient and not rush ourselves through the process.

Let’s take a look at April…

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As you may be aware, last week I decided to experiment with laser focus on one project, cutting out all distractions (to the best of my ability).  It was difficult to stay away from reading e-mail and @ messages on Twitter, but there were a lot of distractions I successfully avoided.  This project, as I’ve mentioned in the past, will be an authority website that’s going to allow me to share the knowledge and wisdom I’ve accumulated throughout my career, and hopefully help people by addressing real problems, issues, and concerns that I know are prevalent in most people’s lives.

Although I’m not ready to share the very specific details and the exact site URL with you yet (this is more for my own protection), I want to talk about what I’ve done and the plans I’ve come up with over the past couple of weeks.

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Today I have a special treat for you – a guest post that should inspire you.  As I’ve said before, I rarely ever publish guest posts on my blog.  In fact, today’s is only the second one I’ve ever published (you can find the first one, Maren Kate’s, here).  The only time I’m really open to publishing guest posts is when they’re written by people I follow and admire – Spencer is no exception.

Like me, Spencer was also a participant in Pat Flynn’s niche site duel.  The only difference is, Spencer has been wildly successful with his niche sites, and has a large inventory of them too (I believe he owns over 200 niche sites!).  I think it’ll be better if I let Spencer explain.

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In the interest of extreme productivity, I’ve decided to perform an experiment for the next week (starting today and ending a week from today).  I’ve come to the conclusion that there is far too much noise in my life – I don’t mean this literally of course, but there are far too many distractions.

There are so many things going on, too many blogs to read, too many e-mails to respond to, etc.  I’m not overwhelmed emotionally, because none of it directly impacts my immediate well-being.  I still go to my 9 to 5 job every day, do a good job, and get my paycheck every two weeks, so it’s not like I’m in any sort of immediate danger.

Every day that goes by where I’m unproductive outside of work, however, probably has a larger impact on my future.  I’m a believer that hard work today will pay off in multiples at some point in the future, so each day’s lack of productivity is probably more detrimental than it seems.

Keep reading for the details of the experiment…

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