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Phew! You guys sure do know how to ask tough questions. 4,000+ words later and I’ve hopefully answered all of the ones which will help as many people as possible. I wasn’t able to answer every single question; some because they were very technical and I didn’t know the answer, others because they were a little too specific and others because I was simply running out of time.
I’m sure that you’ll all find something in here to help you. I’m going to spend the rest of this week focusing on my “Skin” product launch and then you’ll see some pretty exciting things around here.
How did you come up with the name ViperChill? (from James)
Sadly, there’s no cool story behind this one. I was 16 when I registered the domain and just liked the individual words ‘viper’ and ‘chill’. My younger-self though that they sounded cool. I don’t think having a name which has nothing to do with the niche I’m in has hindered me though. I still really like it. Though I love the logo here far more.
Which three books have been essential to your success? (from Oz)
I’m not sure I can credit any book to being the main reason for my success. After all, your own actions play the biggest role in the results you get. That being said, three of my favourite books are Psycho Cybernetics by Maxwell Maltz, Do You! by Russell Simmons and The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. They are very different books, but all played a vital role in helping me get to where I am today.
For Alin: You might also like Rework and Tribes.
My blog is the almost the same as yours in age, it has 2x the number of visitors here but I’ve only got around 400+ RSS subscribers. Is the value of a blog reader worth more than an RSS reader? (from Parka)
RSS readers are far more valuable than a regular reader when it comes to blogging, in my experience. There are exceptions, but generally you make money from blogs by building trust with loyal (read: subscribers) readers who then buy the products you promote which are relevant to the niche you’re writing in. I would rather have 1,000 loyal readers who are subscribed than 5,000 people who land on the site everyday and don’t do anything at all.
How many emails do you get in a day? (from Pat)
These days I only get around 20-30 emails – I have very strict filtering set-up – but every single one tends to require about 5-10 minutes in order to respond to them. Most of them are interview requests, cloud living support requests, or people who are looking for advice on their projects.
If you want to build a remarkable big blog, what would be your three biggest tips? (from Mars)
1) Stop looking for secrets in interviews or Q & A’s. There aren’t any to be found. 2) Put more importance on your content than anything else. 3) Build just a few, but very strong connections in your industry, and utilise them at the right moments.
What is the most effective way you would allocate a small budget for outsourcing other than content? (from Mark)
There were two things that came to mind when I read this. The first being that I would outsource some kind of tool / script creation that other people in my industry can use. For example, when I ran a personal development blog, I paid $100 for an automated script which ranked the most popular blogs in the niche. That page has over 10,000 backlinks pointing to it.
You could also look into buying banner ads on other sites in your industry, or use the money for link building services to help you get more search engine traffic.
Is it worthwhile to promote your twitter profile early on (does it create good social proof to have thousands of followers?) (from Graeme)
Sure. You have to start somewhere. I have artificially inflated quite a few Twitter accounts and to be totally honest, it’s just not worth it. The followers you get just don’t click links, and don’t have much interest in anything you tweet. These days I prefer to just let my account grow naturally. Even though it’s a much slower process, I’m being followed by people who genuinely care about what I have to say.
If you were only allowed to keep one of your many web properties, which one would it be and why? (from Pat)
Without a doubt, ViperChill. Purely because it’s the site that I enjoy working on the most. It’s an added bonus that I have a large audience here who care about what I have to say.
What makes your blog different to all of the other blogs out there? (from Allan)
Really, each reader should have an idea why they read this blog over any other (if they do). I think that being transparent, having a unique viewpoint on the industry and really caring about helping people has been one of the keys to my success here.
Do you still build niche sites for Clickbank products? (from Marcin)
I haven’t done this for about 13 months now. I think Clickbank is a great place to start, and you can make a lot of money from it, but over the long-term you can make much more money by promoting your own offering. Now I prefer to dominate industries and sell my own products, rather than just working as an affiliate.
My question is, how do you know if you’re missing a trick or doing something wrong from a technical point of view? How do I know if I’m missing a string to my WordPress/SEO bow? (from Steve)
I guess you’ll never have a technically perfect site in the eyes of everyone. How search engine’s work is still a guessing game for the most part, although us marketers have certainly figured out the fundamentals. Your best option would be to read up as much on that particular topic as possible, or ask an expert to look over things for you. Some suggestions for your site:
- Make your logo clickable
- Remove the PHP Session ID’s from your navbar links
- Offer email subscriptions with feedburner (your industry probably doesn’t know much about RSS)
How are you managing your time? i.e. How do you avoid the distractions and be more productive? (from Onibalusi)
I use Teuxdeux first of all to help me keep track of all the tasks that I need to do. If you’re constantly trying to remember what’s next, you can’t focus on what you need to do right now. I also give myself time limits to perform certain tasks. It’s no coincidence that if you give yourself all day to do something, that’s exactly how long it will take. If I can’t get something done within the time limit I give myself, I allocate it another “time slot” later in the day.
Turn off all things that aren’t necessary to helping you get things done (Tweetdeck / IM / Facebook – possibly even the internet) and your distractions will be greatly minimised.
Why are you not building a mailing list for ViperChill? (from Onibalusi)
That will change when I release my free report. I told myself I didn’t want to do it in the first year of the site because many people perceive things like that as spammy – especially in this industry anyways. I wanted to build my brand and show people that they can trust what I have to say.
If you couldn’t blog about internet marketing or making money online, would you still say that blogging is a good way to make money? (from Diggy)
Definitely, though I wouldn’t say that it’s a quick way to make money. In fact, if you’re looking to make some fast cash online, blogging is definitely not the area I would start in. There’s a ton of people making lots of money from blogging in lots of different industries – celebrity gossip, politics, humour, personal development, forex, to name a few – so it’s not just this internet marketing niche where people can thrive.
The great thing about blogging is that you can build a very loyal audience, which is what you essentially have to try and do with whatever type of website you build, in order to make money.
Please recommend me top 3 secret/hidden/unknown/unexploited/underrated resources on how to make money online. (from Nechita)
My favourite resources are Shoemoney.com (although I only find 1 in 10 posts relevant), WarriorForum.com and Blackhatworld.com. Blackhat world is full of shady tactics and dirty marketers, but you can learn a lot about the opportunities out there. The site actually gives me a lot of good whitehat ideas.
What would be one thing you like to go back and change about your blogging/web business? (from Sudhir)
I have made a ton of mistakes, but I learned from every single one, so I wouldn’t want to go back and not make them all over again. I guess the only thing that makes sense to change is to be more productive with my time. I wasted weeks, if not months, following strategies I had no real interest in, just because I heard they would make me money. I wish I had just focused on one site until it started bringing in money.
Why don’t you promote anything on this blog? No ads, no affiliate links, nothing. Is there a clever reason for that or are you just doing it for the readers and don’t need the income you could possibly earn? (from Martin)
Partly because I don’t need the money, partly because this niche is looked down upon for some of the reasons you mention. It also seems to have worked in my favour – marketing wise – because when many people write about me they mention my lack of affiliate links and ads as a positive thing. I wanted people to see that this blog really is about helping the readers.
What are your future plans with this blog and making money online in general? (from Martin)
I think this post is a good, lengthy answer to your question.
When posting to do-follow blogs how useful are they for building backlinks? (from Ron)
I really don’t waste my time on do-follow blogs anymore to be honest. There are far better ways to build links, and most of your do-follow links are on pages which link out to hundreds of other irrelevant sites. I used to use it in one artsy industry where it was hard to get links and they worked well, but I wouldn’t focus on this if I were you.
I loved your post, “How I Really Built a Blog with 6,500 subscribers”, you gave some really great insights in it. I was just wondering if you can give a rough estimate on the number of guest posts you wrote for it? (from Joe)
About 25.
What signals let you know that a niche site you have created is not going to work? When do you pull the plug on non-working sites? (from Parleo)
When you’re ranking highly and not getting much search traffic / other quality traffic source. Every niche can make money, and affiliate sites for the most part can be left completely alone, so you wouldn’t need to take them down if they aren’t making a ton of cash. If they’re getting traffic and not converting at all – despite having a good site – then I would personally stop working on it.
What business model (or mix of business models) would you recommend to someone who has never had an online business before (no list, no blog, no followers, etc.), has no particular expertise, and who aspires to generate an average of $4000/month? (from Ben)
I’ll give you credit for a very specific question 
. Start learning more about marketing and build a site – any kind of site – in a niche that interests you. Heck, build affiliate sites, blogs, forums. You’ll quickly learn web skills that will help you with every kind of website, and you’ll see which type of site you’re most passionate about working on. From there you can look around your niche and see what’s missing, or how you can do things differently.
When you’ve found the type of site you want to build, stick with it. It’s going to be a slow process, and it’s going to take a lot of work. Do not let yourself start another site until it has at least made back your domain and hosting costs. This last point is crucial.
Do you recommend article spinners? (from Ryan)
It depends on what you’re doing. I don’t use them personally, simply because I don’t think they are necessary. I have tried a few “shady” tactics when it comes to article marketing and they work surprisingly well. I’ll probably blog about it in the near future.
I was wondering which type of sites you find do better in terms of making money, product ones or information ones? (from Shaun)
Other people will tell you different answers, so don’t take this as the ultimate advice. For me personally, I prefer information websites. I have improved my writing skills over the years and I feel like there’s a lot I want to say. Naturally, information sites appeal to me.
I think a better question for me to ask you would be: “Which would you prefer to build?”
How do we get your life? (from Ralph)
Work hard, be prepared to fail, and stop looking for secrets.
I’m launching a blog soon and I’ve been wondering if it’s a good idea to start promoting it the moment I publish the first post or if I should wait until I’ve posted more content? (from Sofia)
It’s entirely up to you. I launched a blog at 17 where the first post was featured on four of the Technorati top 100 websites. If the first post is good enough, then I would get promoting from the start. Just make sure you have your clear call to actions (RSS subscribers / email list) in place before you do.
How do you use Facebook to grow your business? (from Glam Gals)
To be honest I do very little with Facebook. I tried running some ads as a test but didn’t get very far with them (for this website). Right now I just promote the ViperChill fan page, where there is an application which automatically posts links to our latest articles. The whole point is about being where your audience interacts.
I wonder, since Cloud Living has been out for a while, is there much about the mini-site section you would change? (from Paul)
Not really. The only thing I would suggest is that people add a lot more content to their sites (30+ pages). It seems like it is becoming favoured by Google these days.
Glen, what motivated you to become an online marketer in the first place and how didn’t you quit? (from Omid)
I never set out to become an online marketer, I just saw a friend building a website at school one day and thought it looked cool. From there, I of course stumbled upon ways to make money with websites, and that’s when I got into marketing. It just so happened that I was far more interested in the marketing rather than any of the passions I was building websites around.
I kept going purely out of the love for what I was doing. I also love having an audience, so I think that’s a big drive for me.
When you first started out learning affiliate marketing and SEO several years ago, who were your role models and what are they up to today? (from Ryan)
Jeremy Schoemaker (www.Shoemoney.com) is someone who inspired me with his big adsense and affiliate checks. I really looked up to people like Rand from Seomoz.org, Dave Naylor from Davidnaylor.co.uk and Joost De Valk from Yoast.com. Right now I think they’re all doing pretty much exactly what they were doing back then which is awesome to see.
My question is about where you see yourself long-term, such as in 10-20 years from now? (from Karen)
To be honest, I really have no idea. In a way that excites me, but on the other hand it scares me as well. I hate that I haven’t found a country that I want to call my home; it seems like I’ll have to travel the world a lot more to figure that one out. It affects my relationships quite a bit as girls can’t rely on me to stay in one place, but thankfully I’m still young.
I want to be working more with my family and ensuring they are financially stable, while having a house in a city I eventually call my home. From there I still want to travel, take part in projects like building schools in Vietnam, and continue to work on improving myself.
When building niche sites, which strategy do you take? (from Kevin)
I tend to build two types of affiliate sites, depending on how competitive a niche is or how web-savvy the audience are. When I first started out I would build simple, 5 page websites with the homepage being optimised to send people to a product page via my affiliate link. I still have a few sites like this but these days I’m spending time working in more competitive industries.
For these competitive industries I’ll start out with a site that looks more like a blog, add a lot of content, and build links to it with this frame. As I start getting search traffic I’ll tweak the site to include products I want to promote, and eventually, sell my own product.
How do I monetize a forum, other than using Adsense? (from Rison)
Adsense, by nature, is generally pretty poor on forums. Try offering a paid membership that will give people more user privileges or access to different parts of the forum. Failing that, try building a tool that your visitors would be happy to purchase.
You talked about cross-promoting in a small group of blogs to grow faster. Can you expand on that? Does it work cross niche? (from King)
You should find what you’re looking for in this article. I would try to stay focused on the niche you’re in.
Aside from keyword research and SEO, what are tactics (sustainable or unsustainable) that can immediately increase uniques and pageviews for a particular site that are white-hat? (from Michael)
Unless you’re just looking for impressions to make more money via banner ads, I think you’re asking the wrong question. You can easily increase pageviews by buying ads on other sites or getting paid reviews. As far as free traffic goes, look into StumbleUpon (my guide here). It was the second most popular source of traffic for ViperChill over the last year.
I personally like to build relationships with other people / websites in my niche and use those connections to get more eyeballs on my content.
By taking a quick look at my site – TickTockTimer dot com – what smart and easy thing could I do to increase its ranking in google for the search term ‘online timer’? (from Bamboo)
Allow people to embed a smaller version on their website which links back to you. Get yourself in front of audiences who are going to want this type of thing – chefs, productivity geeks – and start making some connections.
Did you ever make a mistake or a move for one of your big blogs/projects (could be Viper Chill, Plugin ID, Cloud Living) that had you not pushed through, you wouldn’t be the success that you are today? (from Moon)
I think just continually striving to improve them as sites / products was the most important thing to their individual success. Had I been happy with my work being mediocre, I definitely wouldn’t be where I am today.
I wanted to know if you could address your criteria for selecting a place to guest post? (from Roshawn)
I generally just look at the number of subscribers a site has, and how active their audience are. Alexa also gives a good indicator as to whether their RSS numbers are artificially inflated, or they actually get a lot of site traffic. If a blog is getting a lot of comments – the most important factor for me - I’m happy to write there. An engaged audience is far more likely to click through to your website.
Your ‘brand’ is now huge, do you ever feel overwhelmed with the pressure that comes with each post? (from Marcus)
Great question. My answer is: Yes and no. I don’t feel pressure to “impress” 10,000 people, but I do feel pressure to put out quality content on a regular basis. I feel like I am disappointing people when it takes me a while to come out with a new article. Saying that though, I would rather have the pressure of people wanting me to do well than anything else in life, so I take it as it comes.
As far as me being a “steady” guy (second part of your question) I practice the Sedona Method a lot. I find it really helpful in day to day life.
If you plan on selling an ebook or adding a membership program to your blog, should you ever hold back putting any of this good “meaty” information in your free daily/weekly blog posts so that it’s only available in your ebook/membership area? (from Curtis)
A good rule to follow is to give away as much as you can, but not too much. You need to give away great information in order for people to know you’re the real deal and have something great to say. However, as you seem to know, you have to draw the line somewhere, or there’s no point in people spending money.
I like the idea of working on an “overall guide” which covers everything you know. For example, I don’t hold back in any of my posts, but sales of Cloud Living are booming even though they contain very similar information. People like to have everything in one place, so give that to them.
What do you say to those who insist that you must post daily, if not 3-4 times a week, in order to be “successful.” (from Richard)
Look at ViperChill 
.
I don’t have anything business related to ask… but, I was wondering. How was the bungee jump? (from Grant)
It was amazing. It’s the second one I’ve done, but far scarier than I remember the first being. You’re dangling 200+ metres below a bridge, just hanging in the beautiful mountains of South Africa. The weird thing was that after my jump – while waiting for the bungee SWAT team to come and get me – I couldn’t hear anything. The world was very silent; I could just see and feel everything around me.
I’m going to go and do it again this week.
Would you please describe the challenges and bonuses of living a mobile internet business lifestyle? (from Naomi)
I would say the challenges are:
- Focusing on work, even when you don’t have to
- Dealing with friends and family who assume that because you work from home, you’re always free to help them / hang out
- Finding the motivation to sit down and get things done when you’re able to do anything else that you want
The bonuses for me are:
- Having an unlimited income bracket. The harder (or smarter) I work, the more money I can make
- Being able to work on things I love. Though motivation can wane, I generally find it easy to get going again
- Not having to answer to someone. I really struggled with this in my previous jobs
- Setting my own hours and being able to decide how I spend my time each day
Do you think investing a lot of time in IM is going to get me anywhere to a fulltime income (12,000 euros per year) in the next 12 months? (from Johnny)
I don’t see why not. I’ve done it myself a few times. I personally wouldn’t focus on things like Hub Challenges or a ton of Clickbank products. You end up with a lot of mediocre projects and nothing that is going to massively increase your income. Focus on a few sites, sure, but not dozens.
Your real focus should be on building a quality site in an industry you love – not how much money it can make you. Forgetting about how much money you make, surprisingly or not, is more likely to increase your income.
Which was the very first product(s) you promoted as an affiliate marketer? (from Huzefa)
I think it was something in the Tattoo industry, which was a total disaster.
How do you come up with ideas for your posts? (from Harry)
Sometimes I will actively go out on the web looking for ideas from other industries; most of the time though I’m doing something totally unrelated to marketing and an idea will pop into my head. The important thing is that I get the idea down on paper or on my phone as soon as possible. This post should also help you.
What is the easiest way to get started (blogging, mini-sites, website flipping,etc)? (from Tanvir)
I would start by registering a domain and setting up hosting. Then, building any kind of site which you don’t mind breaking. Set up a blog and try customising the theme via the backend. Or, put together a static HTML site and tweak the code by hand and then look at the results in your browser. Find out what you love to do before you do anything serious.
Do you have a list of rules on how you choose good and profitable keywords to rank for? (from Shinta)
I really just focus on the search volume a keyword has, or use other information I know about the industry. For example, I know a lot of keywords in the mobile space which don’t get searched more than 5,000 times per month, yet are making people tens of thousands of dollars if you can rank for them. Volume only matters if you can make money from it, but I like to see at least a few thousand searches per month for any phrase that I target.
From there, I try to learn as much about an industry as I can to see if there is money to be made.
What is the “Main” process you use to select a niche? (from Gigi)
How do you generate such StumbleUpon Traffic that I see in your monthly stats? Is this a push from friends how ‘like’ an article and then it catches more in a viral fashion? (from Jeffrey)
Really, I just write the best content that I can. I never ask for “Stumbles”, never log into the site myself, and don’t interact with anyone I know who does. The good thing about building a large audience is that people start to promote your content for you. I have written an in-depth guide to StumbleUpon which might be useful to you.
Would you actually make any money with websites and blogs, if no one knew you make a lot of money with such things? Sorry for being as bold as brass in my very first post (from Preexo)
Heh. I started building websites 6 years ago when I was 15. I’ve made money with about 20 other websites before I relaunched this blog (which doesn’t make me any money) last year. One example you might never have read was the personal development blog I sold last year for a mid five-figure fee, which was consistently making over $5,000 per month.
P.S. If there are any questions I missed and you really feel like you need me to answer them, please post them in the comments. I tried to answer questions which would help as many people as possible.
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wow wow wow wow
that’s what I call an E_P_I_C evergreen magic article. So much valuable information. Lots of which helps me a lot. Thanx for taking the time and answering all of these questions Glen.
You shine !
Mars
You’re welcome Mars
Glad you liked the answers
Wow, this is awesome. I find it pretty impressive that you were able to get to 6,500 with only 25 guest posts. If I may ask, what was the average subscriber base for each of these sites on which you guest-posted? Any recommendations for blogs that were particularly effective?
I’ve been using guest posts to promote my own blog with some success, and I’d like to expand.
Glad the bungee jump was amazing!
If I had to guess, I would say about 4,000
Agreed. Glen has done a fantastic job. I can’t wait to see what surprises he has in store next for all the readers.
What a huge list of information here. It’s another Q&A .. but with some valuable information here. No magic bullets but by now we all should know there aren’t any.
Thanks for taking the time to answer all those questions, it seems the “online income” world has changed from when I first started reading about in in 2008. Two years on the internet if a lifetime.
My take-away message from your blogpost is “get in touch with major players in your niche” Thanks Glen!
You’re welcome Christiaan,
Nice takeaway
Hey Glen, thanks for taking the time to respond to all these questions.
One thing that I really got out of it was that it brings you down to Earth. There’s so many people out there trying to use a ton of programs, test the latest product or service, subscribe to all these things and you just come out and say “it’s simple really, just do work”.
It hits home because we all want to believe there’s a lot of these really special tactics that only a few know how to employ to get where you’re at but you’ve dispelled that – gives a lot of inspiration to get things done.
Hey Murlu,
No problem. That’s my main point I think, though it took me a few years to really internalise it.
Your story as a whole is pretty admirable – I love the idea of blogging/making money on topics that you like. In my opinion, you can definitely see whether the person actually has interest in the subject just by the way they write. it’s that little extra ‘something’ (like passion) that makes the content that much more enjoyable to read.
Great questions and great answers. I think this post will spark a lot of side projects now that that you have gotten our creative juices rollin’.
Good point Nick; you can definitely see it.
Thanks for the feedback
Glen,
What a great post and an even better community you’ve built! I did have one question which I didn’t get a chance to send your way before you published this answers post:
In the past (specifically around World Cup) you spoke about “seasonal/one time event” type sites, but never followed up. Could you talk more about the time you spent on this or similar sites, the return/any epic fails, and how you approach these sites knowing you must rank quickly.
Thanks,
Jonathon
Hey Jonathon,
Sorry I never saw that one. I try to get the exact match keyword; even if it’s a .net or a .org then get some quick directory submissions so the site is indexed. Most of the time, that’s actually enough, as I pick niches nobody else thought of ranking for. I spend a lot of time building sites for competitions
Hi Glen,
Thanks for responding! One quick follow up question- by in large for these types of sites what types of monitization have you found to be the most successful? i.e. travel/accommodations, adsense, info products, etc.
Thanks again,
Jonathon
Awesome stuff, Glen! I’m thrilled to see your success. This is the only IM blog that I read (unless my memory fails me. that tends to happen so you never know, but I’m pretty sure), and it completely kills all the other ducks in the water.
I myself am more of a build bigger sites kind of guy, just because they are a lot more fun, and I feel better when I’m putting out more value.
Keep the rock up!
Hey Henri,
It has been a while. Thanks man!
Will do
Hi Glen,
What an super amazing post glen. Really super awesome stuff here.
I was thinking about why you haven’t started building your mailing list, but i got my answer from this post. Can’t wait to read your ebook.
You’re doing super awesome work dude and these are fantastic answers.
Thanks for sharing this awesome post
!!
Glen,
You are amazing. Thanks!
Ryan
Right back at ya!
I meant to ask this yesterday, but what do you think about Pay-Per-Click usage for mini sites? Do you think it’s worth it? Or are they better for blogs?
There are tens of thousands of people who make their living from doing PPC – Minisites. I just never got into it, personally.
Thanks. I don’t really like the idea of PPC, and I was hoping that it wasn’t going to be necessary.
Yo Glen, I’m tired just for reading that..I can’t believe you answered that many question,,but you did it..
“TrafficColeman “Signing Off”
My fingers are pretty tired
Wow, that’s a lot of questions. No wonder you’re so busy :p
I’m proud of you~
Good luck with your product launch.
Wow, what a wealth of information. Thanks for taking time out to answer all of our questions!
You’re welcome Roshawn
Love the 1) Stop looking for secrets in interviews or Q & A’s. There aren’t any to be found. 2) Put more importance on your content than anything else.
I have realised the exact same thing, great content is really what matters – today and in the future as it will always be there.
Thanks for excellent answers Glen!
Thanks Jorgen!
I think people in the IM field (that aren’t yet making good money) need confirmation that they’re on the right track because it’s not always clear. That’s one of the great things about your blog is that you have been successful and you give people confirmation that they are doing things the “right way.”
What do you think?
I’m sure that’s why some people come here – validation that they’re on the right path
Awesome Answers Glen,
This is really cool and your answers made my day.
I really love your point on being more productive (answer to my question) and believe me, I will begin to be more productive from now on
. Thanks to you!
I now get why you haven’t been building a list and I will be expecting one soon – I hope I will be the first to subscribe.
Another thing so kind of you is linking to all those who asked – this is so kind of you.
Thanks so much,
-Onibalusi
You’re welcome Oni,
I hope my answers helped
Hi Glen,
Could you detail some more options to gain backlinks as I know you said above that you don’t waste your “time on do-follow blogs anymore”.
This should help: http://www.viperchill.com/link-building/
This is really kind of you. Thanks so much Glen.
Glen,
You certainly are a wealth of information and very well written. So much good stuff here (as always). Now I am going to have to spend another few hours researching all the sites, posts and people you referenced. Love your writing style and the juiciness of your content. I prefer quality over quantity any day so keep it up. Don’t rush your work no matter what anyone tells you. In fact, I try to read a little from a variety of blogs to get different perspectives. The ones who update three times a week or more lose me because I just can’t keep up. Lifehacker is a good example of that. I used to follow them but they update so many times each day that it’s like trying to sip water from a fire hose.
Appreciate the kind words, Mark
HOLY CRAPOLI GLEN!!! This was phenomenal! Thank you for answering our questions and for being such an ‘open source’ guy. This post is like 40 posts in one, chock full of enough info to get anyone off to the races…Thanks for doing what you do
Haha, thanks Marcus
You’re welcome. Thanks for the support!
Glen, this is a great list of information.
A huge resource, which you pointed out, and one, which many readers may glance over is BHW. As you rightfully mentioned the irony with most of the tactics discussed there is that they can be applied in a white hat and ethical manner.
Many of the tactics discussed there are cutting edge and eventually become IM products and thus, saturated and onto the next thing.
Thanks Jon,
Good to see you’ve had a similar experience
WOW, this was quite a blog post, 10 pages…interesting. Thank you for all the great info you share.
About those books, I will check them out, today I received 4 so these will be the next on my list. (I’ve read more books in the last month then in 4 years of High-School)
I just finished my first product and website design, in two days I want to have my sales letter and a bonus product finished too and then I’m ready to go. I want to take my projects really serious this time and I want to change my life too. At “Someday” section on teuxdeux.com I have a line saying: “10,000$/month by the end of 2011″ and I’m sure I’ll get there faster if I do something about it. I no more want to be reach, at least not in money. I want to have time and resources to what I really want with my life and of those around me.
I will be 20 in December, I’ve made money online since I was 16, paid for most of my expenses. Left home with 30 euros and spent 4 months in Western Europe. It was fun, but I know I can do much more, so I’m doing it now.
Thank you! You helped me.
Best of luck with your goals Alin
I’m glad the book recommendations are helpful
I wanted to ask a question, but I thought too many people would take you up on your offer and mine would get lost. These are some great answers.
Thanks. Maybe next time?
Glen,
What do you think of Adam Short’s Niche Profit Classroom? I am a member and it seems like a good system but I am having a tough time understanding why most people in the forums are not making money. The sites he teaches us to build are basic looking sales pages, which is very sales like to me and I would think would turn off a lot of people. Do these sales pages still work well or does the Blog look work better?
Thanks
I’ve never heard of it to be honest Steve, so it woudln’t be right to give any feedback.
That’s probably similar to what I used to spend most of my time building in the past. I’m guessing he’s also telling people to use PPC, which isn’t what I like to use.
Appreciate the feedback. And looking forward to the launch of your product.
You’re welcome BF
EPIC post Glenn!
Aside from keyword research and SEO, what are tactics (sustainable or unsustainable) that can immediately increase uniques and pageviews for a particular site that are white-hat? (from Michael)
You forgot to add link to (my guide here).
I’m not sure what you’re saying…
You forgot to add link to the STUMBLE UPON guide here.Here is a part of your answer to Michael’s question.
” As far as free traffic goes, look into StumbleUpon (my guide here). It was the second most popular source of traffic for ViperChill over the last year.”
You forgot to add link to the phrase “my guide here”.
I would have explained you more clearly if there are question numbers.:)
I was hoping you could expand on Mark’s question. How to outsource link building? I recently posted a request for link building on eLance but I am not satisfied with the offers- they all use different tactics that may or may not yield great results. Are there some things you should ask a link builder to do or not do?
I use the services section of forums.digitalpoint.com – ask them to show you rankings they’ve been able to successfully attain.
Awesome, thank you for this post Glen!
You’re welcome
Hey Glen,
Thanks for taking the time to respond to as many questions as you did. While my question didn’t get answered, I appreciate the valuable information you shared.
Thanks MIchael,
Feel free to post it again if it wasn’t one of the overly-technical ones
Glen,
Once again, you’ve outdone yourself. This was a really great idea. Great of you to show your generosity by giving away so much.
(Even if you didn’t answer MY question
—I realize it was pretty specific)
Of course, the best way to get rewards is to give stuff away —impressive how you manage to fit stuff in with your hectic schedule.
Or maybe the fear of death from the bungee jump made you realize [or realise]
how precious life is.
Thanks again. Keep up the great work.
Dave
Haha, sorry if I missed your question Dave!
Thanks for the support
Hi Glen,
How would you know if there’s enough money in a specific niche to earn a full time income. Besides the obvious, are companies buying Adwords ads for the search terms and whether there are well performing Clickbank products in the niche, are there any other telltale signs you’d recommend looking for before diving in and creating a site?
W
A few ways:
There are more, but I’m sure you get the point. You can never truly know, you just have to go for it sometimes.
That’s the question you answered for me
Haha, I feel such a nob now…
Do you have a % spending on adwords or start capital.
I’m trying to rank a site better without spending money (just to see what happens) on adwords.
Currently using WProbot on that one, again to see what happens, but want to change a few things and write a few things myself or outsource a few items.
So yeah.. adwords spending… (didn’t see it in Cloudliving but seems more and more a necessity to attract traffic) Although the niche is pretty specific.
Hi Ralph,
I’m not sure how you can get adwords traffic without spending money? I also don’t believe that adwords ads affect your organic rankings. PPC isn’t an area I feel like I’m qualified to give advice in, to be honest.
Was more to ask how to get traffic without relying on adwords..
What is your user on BHW? :O
That’s private
I really applaud for your generosity and for having a sincere intention to help people out. Thank you for your very honest, straight-to-the-point answers. They are all very helpful.
You’re welcome Shina,
Thanks for your question!
Wow Glen, you answered a lot of questions, including mine, so thank you! It’s been quite an entertaining read and I’m not sure why I didn’t ask you about not creating a list yet. Looking forward to it and hope you’ll share more awesome stuff.
Thanks Moon, I’m glad you liked the answers.
Hey Glen – thanks for all of the answers. It was a fun and inspiring read! Just a quick question/heads up: viperchill.com doesn’t seem to use a h1 anywhere, which makes for a strange document outline. Is this intentional?
Not really, I just haven’t found a place I want to incorporate it into the design. I’m open to any suggestions.
On a blog-ish site like this I usually work it in like this:
- If we’re on an archive page (or any page with several posts), make the page title – your logo in this case – the h1, and the post titles h2.
- If we’re on a single post/page, make the post title the h1.
It makes sense semantically. Should be decent for search engines, but I haven’t tested – I usually build stuff for an existing audience.
It seems I am an unlucky guy to be here today, I should have known your blog earlier, anyway better late than never. Great stuff to read on. Thanks
Next time, Tinh!
bungee SWAT
i’d also def do it again but this week goddhaymm!! hahaha showed my grandparents the vid and my grandfather called me that night to say he’d give me R2k to take my grandmother to do it while she’s screaming nooo nooo in the background 
loved this all round. golden common thread that stood out for me was to not make mediocre side projects, just focus on one thing and make it amazing. supremo inspiring.
also gave me some really cool ideas
so excited to get back into this faaaak.
stay blessed homie
a
hahah – nice
Two more days and it’s happening again
great post! thanks for answering all those very very interesting questions… very valuable stuff!
P.S. google doens’t like h1 very much, does it…?! good reason to not use it
They <3 h1′s
i wouldn”t say they love h1′s… they more or less don’t just give too much about them… and overdoing it won’t end in a benefit
so i would stay on the safe side and not use it at all and still be ranked very well 
but actually this debate was declared to be over
http://www.viget.com/inspire/ending-the-great-h1-debate/
…oh and i have a Q:
Is it possible to add your feedburner subscribers to a mailing list or do you have to run 2 separate lists? And would you rather market to a mailing list or your subscribers for a product launch, and why?
just seen a bunch of product launch peeps doing customised mailing sequences to a list that don’t seem feasible with a blog, though i’ve also seen ways to send posts to just your feed subscribers etc.
I’m pretty sure you have to do it separately. However, if you start with Aweber, you can also send blog updates to those subscribers as well as personal emails. Mailing list people just tend to convert better, as you can be a lot more personal (use their name).
Hello Glen,
Great post! My question would be:
I did what you wrote in cloud living, built a website, ranked fourth in google, got traffic, but no conversion – from your post this is obvious that I should just abandon the site (especially that searches of the specific keyword significantly dropped out of the blue)
So, the question is that is there a way to make sure that a certain nice with a certain keyword in a good position will make X amount of money in Y amount of time? (we are talking about micro sites here).
Thanks an keep up the good work!
If the traffic is high, then you can try other monetisation options or improve your copy.
I answered this a few comments above as well, which should help
Fair enough, thanks
Ps: what do you think what are other good monetisation methods regarding microsites? Would you say adsense? Mailing list? Thanks!
Glen,
Do you think the traditional 1 column sales pages are still effective for affilliate marketing? I’m referring to sites like http://www.cichlidfishcenter.com. (not my site). I really would like to know if I’m wasting my time building one.
Thanks
Hello Glen, congratulations for the post!
Let me make one question:
When you start a small project, and buy or make thousands of backlinks to it, and soon after to. How long after he gets into one of the first places in their main keywords?
Tnx!
Now that is a top notch post
Glen thank you for answering all those questions. I love books and I am going to purchase Do You! by Russell Simmons and The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. Thanks for sharing.
Hi Glen,
Your post actually did…make my jaw drop on a table.
You post tons of resources that are like empty my mind when I read them. I’m kinda sad because I didn’t have a chance to ask you a question so I hope you can have a second Q&A post like this.
Thanks, Glen!
Hi Glen — I’m a new reader to this site and a very engaged and grateful one at that. Unfortunately I missed the question post and hope you might answer this one: What kind of editorial strategy do you put into the content of your other sites (not counting this one)? By this I mean how do you manage or ensure the editorial quality of posts, copy, etc.? Do other people create your content for you?
Thanks so much for your consideration in answering.
Glenn, I think you are surely insane typing all these answer. Thanks a lot contributing your time and energy to answer most of the question that has been play in my head for a long… long time.
Thanks Glen, for answering all those questions (and mine as well). The information value you give is amazing. You never fail to give everyone of your readers atleast something they didn’t know before.
Wow you sure have the patience ..I would have hit the roof a long time ago
This is A LOT of great content to go through. Thanks for the response Glen, really helpful. Now I know that do-follow blog comments really isn’t the best use of my backlinking time. I was basically trying to do a mix of that , using relevant forums, and a lot of article marketing….the manual way. No V.A.’s…yet.
On a side note, if you’re still looking for a place to call home after you’ve checked out Thailand, have a look at Costa Rica. I’ve heard great things from those who’ve visited and stayed awhile. (Not where I live, but I definitely wanna spend some time there)
certainly that’s a very useful and interesting post
Love the information so much I bought Cloud Living. I will not be exercising my right to a refund. Good, solid basic stuff. I love your approach: no secrets, just go and do it. Getting started is the key. I was holding back because I thought I could not keep writing and developing articles. Now I have over 30 topic phrases in the pipeline awaiting completion which usually takes me about 30-45 minutes.
Hi Glen,
OMG! Thanks for the comprehensive answers to all these questions! Nice work!
Best regards,
John
Great Q&A about you and your lifestyle. I really enjoyed reading it.
What I wonder is the following: Did’t you sell your website that made you 5k a month too cheap? I mean, shouldn’t you hav gotten at least 180k (3 years in revenues) for it?
Btw, this might be another idea for a post: how to value websites.
Hi Glen, been following your blog for a while now. One question.
Why not .info domain names? what’s the deal with .info domains?
Cheers mate,
Hello,
Where do you get the pictures you use on Viper Chill? You know, those white dummy people.
Thanks.
iStockPhoto
Now this is cool. One on one dealing with your audience , does it get any better ?
Now I have a serious question my self.
I recently started a forum on one of my established 2 year old site. The forum lied around for a bit and soon people signed up. I failed to notice was their profile pages were full of viagra and cialis links. They x-rummered this pages and i got slapped by google on my serps , from top 5, I dropped to the 2nd page for my major keyword. I removed the forum all togather and I got my site reconsidered , submitted site map again and again but still no effect on the serps
What do I do ?
Help me out.
This a very cool initiative glen….please i have just one question.
where or what software or how do you build links to your niche blogs or websites?
which paid link building service do you use to build links for your blog niche?
Thanks Glen
Any update on your $1M Case Study?
Hey Glen…. long time no speak!
This isn’t a question I REALLY need answering, but thought I’d ask it anyways. I’m done with traveling in Australia. Fancy doing some of Thailand with me? haha. Feb 2nd…. take some time off, do it!
All I can say now Glen is, thank you, thank you, thank you
As per your advice, I’ll definitely begin advertising online. However, if I do want to earn via banner ads, will SEO be the best traffic generation method so I can generate more impressions?
Glen, thanks so much for sharing this excellent information – on behalf of everyone . . . keep it coming!
Thanks for taking the time to answer all these questions, was very good for content.
Dwight Anthony
Financially Elite Blog dot Com
Concerning this topic, it is difficult to find reliable suggestions on the Web. Thanks for sharing your recommendations on travel tips and related topics. Incidentally, do you have any honest opinions on where I can get more useful information on the Web? Keep up the good work!
Glen,
Your blog entries are absolutely perfect. I wasn’t really interested in Blogging and all these stuff, but after reading cloud living and your blog.. I finally realized it has a very big potential. You’re my idol!
I hope to reach your level in Blogging one day
I don’t think it’s needed to mention this but Keep up the good work as always
All the best,
Nima
Glen,
Is started following your tips, and have seen a great increase so far in my site traffic. Great content is key!
Thanks for the continued advice!
Robert @ The College Investor
This is really kind of you. Thanks so much Glen.
Wow, SO MUCH useful information here, and still so much more to read! I now have about 5 additional information-rich articles to read that were linked to from this post.
Thanks so much for taking the time to answer questions from your readers! That just proves that you really are in it to help people, and it makes the information even more valuable!
Christina
Nothing in 18 days? 4-5,000 words per post is great but once a month? You do offer a lot of value but what about a 100 word post update concerning what you’re up to or some details about your product launch? Are you going to step away from blogging and focus on your software endeavors?
Not at all. After tomorrow I’m back to work
How will that 100 word post help you? If he wanted to give details about his product launch he would have done it but I guess he decided is better this way.
I think only a few quality posts in a month is great, “less is more”, he provides a lot of value. Posting every day will just keep us ‘busy’ not being able to put his advices at work.
I was really interested to know details about the software too but I knew that he knows better what he is doing so I just put some money aside waiting to see if is something I’m interested in.
3 more hours(or two), I’ll be around
Glen, this post is incredible. I don’t mind admitting that I started reading it on my iPod Touch this morning (while I was on the potty) – and it engaged me to the extent that I got cramps when I finally got done with nature’s call!
My wish for you is that the kindnesses you share with all of us through informative and practical posts like these will return to you a thousand-fold. THANK YOU for creating this Q&A post – it will serve as a mini-manual for me in my efforts to experience success in the IM world. You’re awesome!
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Honestly, your posts are gold glen and I have so much respect for you being as successful as you are.
Content like this is awesome and really hammers home that creating a completely free-content-based website can pay off long term. Thanks for the share man.
Hi Glen,
Just discovered your site last week and reading everything on it ever since. This is a great site for a wannabe website builder like me.
I am planning to build an information website, something along the lines of Huffington Post. The HuffPost is basically a news aggregator and mine will be a toned down version of it since this will be a one-man operation. It will focus on a niche related to economics. I have a few questions regarding that.
1. Is it realistic to expect to make around $400 every month through affliates and ads if I work fulltime on it?
2. If I charge $1 per month to members who want extra information and access to private forum. How realistic is it to get around 1000 members per month?
3. Finally, what happened to your million dollar project and the ad you shot with the FHM model? Can you post a link to the ad. Just wanna see the model
Thanks
Arnold
I love Viperchill and love the fact that you are truly out there to help. I find myself coming back to it all the time! Although I have tons of your articles I just need to ask you for your opinion on what I should focus on with my website. It’s a travel home based business and should I go for getting backlinks, warrior forum, ezine article, all? I want to be as efficient with my time as possible as I am a stay at home mom of three and want to keep it that way!!
Thanks!!
Cristin
great insight. Do You! by Russell Simmons is a favorite of mine as well
Hi Glen,
I have been reading your blog posts like crazy and it’s refreshing to see the amount of authentic information you put out there. Thanks for taking time to answer all the questions here.
I have my own question that I would love for you to answer.
1. What do you suggest for someone who is still full time employed but wants to start an blog sharing what he is doing online to establish an Internet Empire. If he uses his real name, he will be found by the employer? A Pen name? Short version of the real name? Just the first real name and last name made up?
What do you think?
You may be found out. I would use a short version of the real name.
I happened across your site and I have to say this is terrific information. There is so much it will take days to sift through. I particularly like your response to how to make $4000 per month. I’m fairly new to internet marketing and I’ve started a blog and want to get into some niche marketing also. I’ve heard that using a capture page as a home page is a good thing to do (ex: http://www.australianshepherdpets.com/ ) but I’ve seen other sites using a 2 column format.
I was wondering what your thoughts are on this. Is there a benefit to using this format as opposed to a 2 column? Would I be limited in what I could do with the site to expand if I make it a capture page as opposed to a 2 column page?
Thanks for the help,
Bill