Web Tools For Webmasters

I have a secret. For someone who writes a lot about social media, I’m not generally an early adopter. I don’t know if this is because I really don’t like cell phones, so platforms like Twitter and FourSquare weren’t a natural fit. Or because I tend to get addicted to technologies, so I try to avoid them as long as possible so they don’t suck yet more time out of my day. But the truth is George hounded me for about a year to join Facebook. (And I don’t even care to mention how long it took for me to “get” blogging.)

I didn’t want to. It was lame. I didn’t need it. Why should I? Then I joined about 18 months ago. How did I ever live without Facebook? And now I think that any business without a Facebook page is missing out on a monumental opportunity! Do you also want Google to exclude you from the search results?

I still don’t use Twitter a lot. Oh, sure I feed our Facebook page to it, but I leave most of the interacting to George. However, that will probably come to an end sometime in the next couple of months. Once I get a firm grasp on Linked In and Four Square— I need those for particular clients. But Twitter’s next.

So, why am I telling you all of this? Because I want you to know it’s not too late. If you don’t yet have a Twitter or a Facebook account, it’s okay. You haven’t missed the social media parade. In fact, it’s really just getting started.

For businesses, it’s often not that beneficial to be an early adopter. The best time for businesses to adopt a technology is around it’s peak. It’s usually easier (and cheaper) to get training at that point. Your clients and potential customers are already informed about the technology, so you don’t have to convince them that they should WANT to “like” you on Facebook. And there are plenty of people who are already knowledgeable to whom you can outsource the parts of social media that you don’t like or don’t have time to keep up with.

So, if you’ve been avoiding social media, you don’t have to continue to do so. There are some very simple and very effective ways to use Facebook, Twitter, blogging, Linked In and more that will help you make money online and won’t keep you from actually running your business. I’ll be introducing some simple tips and tricks over the coming weeks and months. So, make sure to check back often. But for right now, go sign up for Facebook and Twitter— and throw in LinkedIn while you’re at it. Leave a note down below if you’ve signed up recently, or if you don’t yet have an account and let me know what was/is holding you back.

Have you seen the news that Philadelphia would like to charge a business fee to bloggers in the City of Brotherly Love? There’s a nice roundup of the online discussion of it over on WordStream. I guess my only question is— do they charge all home businesses this “fee”? Mary Kay reps, babysitters, who exactly has to pay? If they’re charging the 16 year old who mows your lawn, then I guess bloggers should pay up. If not, what exactly led to targeting bloggers in particular?

What do you think? At what point does a blog become a business and have to pay the required fees?

It’s been just over a year since I was laid off from my full time job at Hewlett Packard Corporation. I was a JAVA developer there making a nice living which did make it hard to leave on my own. That said, my lay off didn’t come as a huge surprise since roughly 6 months prior to being laid off I told my boss that I wasn’t happy with the work I was being assigned, and I wasn’t sure if I was going to stay. So I was very blessed to get shoved out the door last July, because without that push it was going to be hard to leave that job despite being ready to leave.

Anyway, last July I started doing this “online thing” full time.

I know you might wondering:

So how has that worked out for you?

Have you replaced your nice regular paycheck at HP yet?

Well, yes I have!

Well actually it’s “yes we have”!

My wife Jill and I are running a web design and web marketing company, and we have fully replaced my salary. Now, mind you it’s a lot of work. We both put in about 30 hours of work every week, which amounts to a total of 60 hours a week between the two of us. So it’s not a cake walk by any means.

Right now, Jill handles most of the sales and networking, as well as managing our web design contractors and most of our web design client interaction. If that wasn’t enough, she’s busy becoming our social media expert. I’m in charge of the SEO, PPC, Internet marketing plans, managing our Internet marketing contractors, handling the business operations and the client interactions for our marketing clients. We do quite a bit of overlapping work when it comes to interacting with clients, acquiring joint venture partners and building relationships. It’s been working out really well for us, and the future is looking pretty amazing.

So, yes we have been able to make money online and so can you! In the coming months I will talk a lot more about some of the factors that have helped us build a successful business.

Before I Go!

Before I leave, I just wanted to say that I really do want to help you succeed, BUT everyday I get questions from people wanting FREE advice, and neither my wife or I have the time to answer everyone’s questions personally. If I answered every question I got I would have no time to run a business and no time to spend with my family. So, please don’t be offended if you email us and don’t get an answer in response.

We DO answer many questions posted in the comments in response to a post. We’ll also sometimes answer particularly unique questions in a blog post. And, of course, the content we create for this site is free. But if you have a pressing need for our expertise and want our personalized help in building your business, you can hire us for phone or in person consulting or training. Phone consulting is currently $200/hour (as of August, 2010), but we can help you save hours of looking for an answer online and trying to figure out things on your own.

If you’re anything like my wife, you’re probably thinking “Whoa, Nelly! $200 for the ‘privilege’ of speaking to one of the Mantys for an hour?” Let me explain how the process works. When you contact us to set up a phone consultation, you’ll send us 4-5 questions that can be answered in an hour (ranking them in order of importance, in case time runs out). We’ll then research the answers to your questions— we don’t charge you for that time. So, your “one hour” phone consultation may, in reality, take as many as four or five hours of our time.

Of course, if you have a business and are considering hiring us to design a website or for marketing services, we provide a one hour free consultation. However, that isn’t designed to be a time to answer all of your questions. It’s primarily a time where we can assess how we can best help you and which of our services are likely to benefit you the most. While you may get some useful hints and information out of it, if you want to “do it yourself” and just need direction, you’re much better off paying for a phone consult.

Anyway, we look forward to helping you succeed online and if you would like to see us build a step by step program on making a living online or any other type of program let us know in the comments below.

There is a certain mindset needed for making a living online. It can be the difference between becoming very successful and wasting your time and money for a while before eventually quitting. It’s not easy to make big money online and anyone who tells you differently is flat out lying to you! Therefore, you must truly know deep within yourself that you will never give up no matter what. You need a burning desire to becoming successful at all costs.

Too many people think that making money online is easy or that they are going to get rich just by signing up for some program or buying an ebook. I can’t really blame them most of the time because that’s what they are led to believe by shady marketers and flat out scammers. But the truth is actually the complete opposite… It’s very difficult to make a living online!

Sure, you might be able to earn a little money without a lot of effort. But if you are looking to actually build a full-time income on the internet then you better be ready to do a lot of learning, a lot of hard work, and spend a lot of time before you get there. Having some money to invest into your online business will be very helpful as well. If it were easy then everyone would do it and nobody would have any money problems. Unfortunately, the world doesn’t work that way. So, you can’t go into it with the attitude of getting rich quickly or easily. It’s not going to happen!

What it really comes down is your money making mindset. If you truly believe you will succeed, and you are more than willing to put in the time and effort needed, and get up from all failures, you will be able to make a living online. Know that you will have to work hard to get there but it can be done. Nothing can stop you if completely you believe in yourself and never give up!

It’s been just over a year since I was laid off from my full time job at Hewlett Packard Corporation. I was a JAVA developer there making a nice living which did make it hard to leave on my own. That said, my lay off didn’t come as a huge surprise since roughly 6 months prior to being laid off I told my boss that I wasn’t happy with the work I was being assigned, and I wasn’t sure if I was going to stay. So I was very blessed to get shoved out the door last July, because without that push it was going to be hard to leave that job despite being ready to leave.

Anyway, last July I started doing this “online thing” full time.

I know you might wondering:

So how has that worked out for you?

Have you replaced your nice regular paycheck at HP yet?

Well, yes I have!

Well actually it’s “yes we have”!

My wife Jill and I are running a web design and web marketing company, and we have fully replaced my salary. Now, mind you it’s a lot of work. We both put in about 30 hours of work every week, which amounts to a total of 60 hours a week between the two of us. So it’s not a cake walk by any means.

Right now, Jill handles most of the sales and networking, as well as managing our web design contractors and most of our web design client interaction. If that wasn’t enough, she’s busy becoming our social media expert. I’m in charge of the SEO, PPC, Internet marketing plans, managing our Internet marketing contractors, handling the business operations and the client interactions for our marketing clients. We do quite a bit of overlapping work when it comes to interacting with clients, acquiring joint venture partners and building relationships. It’s been working out really well for us, and the future is looking pretty amazing.

So, yes we have been able to make money online and so can you! In the coming months I will talk a lot more about some of the factors that have helped us build a successful business.

Before I Go!

Before I leave, I just wanted to say that I really do want to help you succeed, BUT everyday I get questions from people wanting FREE advice, and neither my wife or I have the time to answer everyone’s questions personally. If I answered every question I got I would have no time to run a business and no time to spend with my family. So, please don’t be offended if you email us and don’t get an answer in response.

We DO answer many questions posted in the comments in response to a post. We’ll also sometimes answer particularly unique questions in a blog post. And, of course, the content we create for this site is free. But if you have a pressing need for our expertise and want our personalized help in building your business, you can hire us for phone or in person consulting or training. Phone consulting is currently $200/hour (as of August, 2010), but we can help you save hours of looking for an answer online and trying to figure out things on your own.

If you’re anything like my wife, you’re probably thinking “Whoa, Nelly! $200 for the ‘privilege’ of speaking to one of the Mantys for an hour?” Let me explain how the process works. When you contact us to set up a phone consultation, you’ll send us 4-5 questions that can be answered in an hour (ranking them in order of importance, in case time runs out). We’ll then research the answers to your questions— we don’t charge you for that time. So, your “one hour” phone consultation may, in reality, take as many as four or five hours of our time.

Of course, if you have a business and are considering hiring us to design a website or for marketing services, we provide a one hour free consultation. However, that isn’t designed to be a time to answer all of your questions. It’s primarily a time where we can assess how we can best help you and which of our services are likely to benefit you the most. While you may get some useful hints and information out of it, if you want to “do it yourself” and just need direction, you’re much better off paying for a phone consult.

Anyway, we look forward to helping you succeed online and if you would like to see us build a step by step program on making a living online or any other type of program let us know in the comments below.

One of the absolute best ways to market your website and increase your search engine rankings is through guest blogging. Every time you get a guest post published you are getting high quality backlinks to help push your site up the search engines as well as targeted traffic directly from the post itself. In addition to that, you are doing a form of networking with other bloggers in your niche which helps tremendously in building a name for yourself and getting your foot in the door for future partnerships.

Read More »

Jill here. Obviously, George and I haven’t had time to review the entire Main Street Marketing Machines program yet because it’s HUGE! But we got an email that they’re closing the doors Friday at midnight (Pacific), so we wanted to update you on what we’ve looked at so far so that you can make a decision if you’re on the fence. Look, I like to procrastinate as much as the next person, but do not wait until the last minute if you really want to get in on this and don’t want to wait months and months until it opens again. You’ll kick yourself if you forget and don’t get signed up.

Read More »

Can I Make Big Money Online is still on hiatus, but something is about to come out that I’m planning to sign up for, and I thought I should share it with you.

As most of you know, about a year ago my wife, Jill, and I invested in the Local Business Money Machine program. Since then, we’ve built a successful business utilizing that system. We’ve posted about the system before, and we still think it’s a good one, but one of the weaknesses we’ve pointed out is that we think it’s not an ideal match for absolute beginners.

Read More »

Just wanted to quickly mention that the 2010 Winter Olympics are about a week away from starting and my wife Jill and her friend from college, Sherry, are covering the Olympics on our blog:

http://winterolympicsnews.com/

They are both excellent writers, so if you are interested in a unique take on this year’s Olympic Games then click here to check them out.

Also, I wanted to let you know that I have a couple of important announcements to make in the next week or two. One of which is about the future of this blog… so stay tuned!

Why is this my final make money online blog post for now?

Well…

I have really enjoyed writing on this blog over the years. More than that, I have enjoyed all the friends and relationships I have built up over that time as a result of this blog.

However, it’s time for me to take a break from this blog. I considered many options that would keep this blog running smoothly without my interaction, but after a lot of thought and prayer I decided it was time for the blog to go on hiatus. If I decide to start it back up again, it will be a VERY different blog and by different I mean unique. But before I get to that I want to let you know some of the reasoning that went behind this decision…

Focus

My business success really turned around when my friend Austin Davis (of My Honest Mechanic) told me “You have to focus!” Austin is an extremely successful affiliate marketer who focuses on one niche and dominates it. He told me the secret to his success is focusing on that one niche and being the best in that niche.

Lately, I have been mostly focused on building our web design and web marketing business. We have had a lot of success due in large part to our focus on Mantyweb Designs and nothing else. However, with most of my focus on the web design business I just can’t put in enough effort to make this blog what I ultimately want it to be.

I strongly believe that focusing 100% of my efforts on Mantyweb Designs will pay off in a big way. While I did consider having someone else take over the day to day tasks of running this blog, it would still require some of my attention, which would have taken focus off my new business.

The Two Tribes

If you haven’t read Brian Clark’s post about the two tribes you should go do that now by clicking here and then come back to finish this post. The two tribes post on CopyBlogger is one of the best blog posts (if not the best blog post) that I read last year.

In the post, Brian talks about the two tribes in Internet marketing. I have struggled trying to placate members of the “cool kids” tribe, while knowing that the only way to make real money online was to do more of what the “internet marketing” tribe says to do. The truth of the matter is that I am not comfortable with EITHER tribe. I have tried finding a balance between the two, and it’s not easy. Some of my friends fall into one tribe or the other. There are some Internet marketers like Brian Clark and Michel Fortin who have managed to walk the tight rope that is the middle tribe (something Brian is now calling the “Third Tribe”), but it’s a very tricky path. You have to be careful not to swing too far in either direction. To quote Brian:

I wonder, though, if there’s any possible way a tribe could come together that was about building real businesses online without being cheesy, sleazy, or tacky? Could a tribe form around ethical business practices, effective persuasive communication that actually sells something, respectful relationships with customers, and a commitment to keeping the White Hat on at all times?

That’s what I have been trying to do and if I ever take this blog off of a hiatus, being part of the third tribe will be one of it’s primary goals. (Note, a few days after I wrote my initial draft of this message, I got a message about joining the “Third Tribe” membership site and have done so, although I have not had the time to see whether it is worthwhile or not).

Providing Value

I can’t provide you enough value right now, because I am focusing every spare minute on providing our clients value above and beyond their expectations. Which is one of the reasons I have to focus on our new business.

Where can you find me now?

Our blog:

http://mantywebdesigns.com/blog/

My wife Jill and I write about many of the same topics that would come up on this blog on our new blog. The focus is more on small business owners, but in my opinion if you are trying to make money online, you need to consider yourself a small business owner. In other words, our new blog is perfect for you. Click here to check it out.

My Newsletter

I will continue to give occasional tips on my newsletter and let you know when any good, ethical products come along. I won’t be promoting anything that I believe will be a waste of your money (in other words, I won’t be promoting a lot of stuff).

What would I do if I reopened the blog?

6-12 months down the road I may revisit the situation. If I do ever open this blog up again it will be for the right reasons. If I do re-open the blog it’s focus will be on making money online without compromising your values. It will also likely have an interesting twist and it is likely that I won’t be the main writer for the blog. The main thing is that I won’t re-open this blog unless I believe that I can bring a unique perspective to the make money online world. I do have a plan that I feel would do that, but it’s not the right time for me to be doing anything else other than growing my internet marketing and web design company.

Blessings to all of you,
George Manty