Lessons from a 122 Foot Tall Snowman
By Gil | January 4, 2009
That’s right, ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-TWO feet! To be technically correct, it’s actually a 122 foot snow-woman, built in Bethel, Maine as a group effort by the Bethel community. It is a world’s record for the tallest snow-person, and contains about 13 MILLION pounds of snow!
When I saw this, I was amazed and wondered… as an Internet Entrepreneur, what can be learned from constructing this huge snow-woman?
Start now, and with motivation and hard work, you can achieve huge accomplishments.
To get an idea of how large this snowman is, it’s about 28 feet short of being as tall as the Statue of Liberty, without the pedestal. This finished project started out as nothing but an idea in someone’s head. If he/she had kept the idea to themselves, or never pushed forward to get started, this would have never been done. Do you have an idea for a web venture in your mind that you have never started, or think that you’ll get to one day? Why wait, get started now!
The snowman started as idea on an empty lot.
Be creative
As far as I know, there are no readily available kits to make a 122 snow man. Aside from the standard construction equipment, the builders had to get creative in the planning and construction of this snow man. Old street signs tied together made the forms to build the snowman, red painted tires were used for the snowman’s mouth, and trees for arms. The very idea of a huge snowman is unique and creative. I think as internet entrepreneurs, we have standard construction tools we use. Content management systems, HTML editors, graphics programs, ad rotators, plug-ins, and the list goes on and on… but, we need to apply the same creativity to our ventures as well, whether it’s the concept, the site design, the delivery, product, or content. I wonder what is it about my ventures and sites that might want to make vistors stop for a while and look, as they would if they were passing by a 122 foot giant snowman - if there isn’t anything, perhaps I need to be more creative with my sites and their content.
Old street signs were used as forms to build the snowman.
Take one step at a time
Sometimes I get overwhelmed with the size of a project. Can you imagine if someone came up to you and said build me a giant 122 foot snowman. Where would your start? Break the task into smaller ones, and just get started. Here above, you can see one step of building a giant snowman… adding the right arm which, by the way, is a 27 foot Evergreen tree.
Enjoy what you do
This is probably my favorite lesson from the snowman. Look at the people above. You can tell they are happy and having fun. If you were to pay a construction company to build a 122 snowman for yourself, it would cost a fortune in equipment and labor. The people above are just a few who built this giant structure for nothing, other than the enjoyment and the accomplishment of doing it.
I know this goes against the advice of picking a high paying niche, but I am a strong believer that if you are going to venture into internet marketing/entrepreneurship for yourself, you should pick something you love to do or have a passion about. This will keep you going simply because you love doing it. This is the philosophy I have adopted in my ventures. One of my projects in particular is a very low paying niche, but I love working on the site, and it’s starting to pick up traffic and pagerank. I think revenue will follow, but even if it doesn’t make a lot, I still love working on the site.
Wouldn’t it be great to make a nice income and having as much fun doing it as the group of people above appear to be having?
Visit the Bethel Snowman site here.
Topics: Uncategorized, Web Design, Web Publishing | No Comments »
Adsense Earnings Back Up!
By Gil | December 11, 2008
It would seem my adsense earnings are back up to very little, from non-existent. Don’t know what to make of it. I was getting a steady buck a day or so, then everything just went flat. Null. Zero. Then all of a sudden, a $1.86 day. Granted, not a lot, but I’m essentially just starting out… and better than zero.
Seems that the big G has been shuffling, and tweaking the ol’ page rank algorithm lateley. I’m seeing changes in individual page rank ranging from 0 to 2 over the last few months on various pages. Over all, averages are about the same accross the site. Some pages up, some down. I guess that’s to be expected. I’m sticking with the concept of turning out quality content, after all, that’s what Google wants to deliver… however, I need to work on link building. By the way, when I say quality content, I’m talking about my other sites, not neccessarily this blog!
With the dynamic nature of page rank, Google’s search algorithm, and earnings, I still thinks it’s best to have mutliple sites, and sources of revenue… which is what I am actively working on. Sort of the web publishing equivalent of diversification. Hopefully they will average out as fairly steady - some site’s revenue going down, others hopefully up. Of course, it’s hard to call 2 sites diversification. I did register another domain name, however, and I hope to get some content published on it within the next 2 to 3 weeks, or so.
Topics: Adsense | No Comments »
Continued Spammer Problems Finally Solved
By Gil | November 22, 2008
Last post I mentioned I was getting spammed on my local site (See My Projects list) and was looking to put some type of catcha, or verification system. After a week of working on it in my spare time, I finally got that complete, and implemented on my site. And it works great… but the spammer jumped from the section that was being spammed to my classifieds section.
That shows me that this spammer is malicious. I thought his MO was to fly under the radar, sneaking in timed spam posts that are hidden among the legitimate posts. But he obviously found that I blocked his spamming efforts, and instread of conceding that he was caught and moved on… he moved on to another section of the same site, knowing that he was causing me trouble, and that it would be fixed, but not caring.
Not that I expect a spammer to have some code of ethics, but this was the spammers way to say ’screw you, I’m going to cause you some more trouble.’ It gained him another 10 or so spam posts over a 24 hour period, but I added the captcha code to the classifieds section as well. I had planned to do this anyway, but it made me move it up in priority on my ‘to do’ list. I have been spam free for 2 days now.
Topics: Projects, Web Design, Web Publishing | No Comments »
Small Setback - Local Site Being Spammed!
By Gil | November 10, 2008
Ok, minor setback happening to my local site (001, see My Projects), but with my time being so limited, its thowing my plan off shedule.
I have a section that’s called Deals Around Town where any visitor can submit any great deal or buy around town - like buy one get one free sales, 12-pack soda for $2.00, etc. To encourage guest submission, you don’t have to register to submit your deal. Just fill out the fields and submit. Once submitted, there is a ‘report this post’ link so that there is some community moderation for spam, or posts that are inappropriate - but some low life found the site and is spamming it to death. It’s seems automated, because it sends about 2 to 3 spam links each hour, 24/7. You know, the standard prescription medication, jewelery, and fake Rolex spam.
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Evolution of a Niche Site
By Gil | November 3, 2008
I mentioned in an earlier post that previously, I hadn’t posted to this site since last April. I was working on too much at once, and nothing was getting done. I felt like I was just spinning my wheels and getting nowhere, so I had to shift my focus. Part of that focus went to Niche Site 002 (see My Projects list for reference). I worked on this site for over a whole year, trying to make it perfect. Something I have learned along the way is not to try for perfection, you will waste a lot of time. Focus on good content and a decent design an just get your site out there. You can always tweak it later.
Site 002 is centered around an interest of mine, here is how it evolved to what it is today.
First evolution
Niche site 002 first started out as a forum. I put a lot of time looking at the phpBB code to make a custom looking forum. I did a little SEO and people were visiting, but no one was joining…
Second Evolution
So, I decided to completely re-design the forum to a better looking, more web 2.0 looking design. I was really happy with the design… it had rounded corners and great images, but still, no one joining. I was getting visitors, so I treated the forum as a blog, just adding good content as posts, hoping at least a couple of people would register and join in the conversation. Visitors still were coming, and in fact increasing, but still… no one registering. As I would learn, forums are very hard to start from scratch and they are also very high maintenance. Forum spam is a daily battle. Since I was getting readers, I thought I would re-design the site again, this time taking more of a regular content-site approach, with readers also having the ability to easily submit their content, if they wished, without registering….
Third Evolution
Excited with a new direction of the site, I started to work on the site again. Since I am also a web developer in my day job, I decided I would design everything from the ground up. I designed and created a custom database design, a custom made authentication system for users to register and join, if they wanted additional priviledges as registered users, etc, etc… As you can imagine, this all takes quite a bit of time. By this time, over a year has passed since I first registered the domain and started working on this site, but I was still not finished with the custom coding and all. I had recently read about Wordpress being configured to work as a content site, so I did a little research, and decided this would be the direction to go, after all this was getting ridiculous. Over a year later, and still no complete web site.
Fourth Evolution
I have to say, I am impressed with the flexibility of Wordpress. I researched the Wordpress code, and in one weekend afternoon, I was able to make a custom Wordpress template to look just like my previous site. Sure, I had make a couple of concessions on the functionality, but that was a small sacrifice to finally have a working web site! Obviously, this was the way to go for me. I’m finding, with plug-ins, I can probably find the fuctionality that I wanted initially. If not, one can be made. But that can come later. For now, at least I have a functioning site. I have added some of my own content, and I’m starting to get some user generated content on the site as well.
Webservations and Lesson Learned
Use open source content management systems, and templates whenever possible - even if your a developer yourself. You will save a ton of time. After all, whole teams of programmers have made applications, like Wordoress, what they are today. You can always add custom tweaks and images to make the site look unique. Why re-invent the wheel if you can find one already made that will work. It sounds like a no-brainer, but it took me over a year, and a lot of work to learn that lesson.
Topics: Projects, Web Design, Web Publishing | No Comments »