First Sale. It's Like Yesterday.
Many of you probably don’t know this, but it took me THREE FULL MONTHS to make my first sale online.
Three months of hard work. Three months of learning. Three months of doing stuff that didn’t quite work. Three months of doing stuff that actually worked.
One thing that was consistent during this first 3 months was that I felt successful the entire time. I was learning brand new things, I was building a website (which was freakin’ amazing to me), I was creating content that other people could read on the Internet, I was creating “campaigns” and bidding on these keyword things.
It was freakishly cool.
My Landmark First Sale.
The first sale to be honest was just the cherry on top, but I was hitting so many successful days of “accomplishment” that my focus didn’t necessarily revolve around money on the way to this first sale, the progress with my business and the non tangible things like learning to code, build content, adding images, joining affiliate programs, creating campaigns, and helping others fueled my passion.
The reason I am even telling you this, is because people naturally want success now and they want it fast. That is very rarely the case though.
Like a little tiny snowball rolling down a hill of fresh snow, the effort you put forth now and the hard work that you invest in your business, will cumulatively snowball your business.
In other words, the work you are doing this very second WILL NOT pay off this very second. It may pay off a month down the road, it may even pay off a year down the road, but it will more than likely pay off at some point in the future. At sometimes pay off forever.
Yes, Your Work Now Creates FOREVER Potential
It is a beautiful thing. I have literally written content that has paid me for years. One post that took my 30 minutes to write has lead to $1,000’s in ongoing monthly income. I have had single search terms reap me almost a full time income over the years through PPC campaigns. ONE FREAKIN’ SEARCH TERM.
Sounds ridiculous, but anyone that has created any level of success online will be able to share more than one story like this with you.
Sometimes the efforts you put forth never truly strike gold though. That is fine. Not everything you do will be an immediate hit, and sometimes never really finds its purpose in your business, but it is all part of the learning process and the process of “getting better”.
You Will Have Your Highs and Lows.
Michael Jordan, unquestionably the best basketball player to ever step on the court missed millions of jump shots in his life through practice and even in the games he played.
But he also hit lots...and LOTS.
Your business will behave the same way.
Your business is foreshadowed by your “current” effort. But your current business is not the result of your current effort, it is a result of your past effort.
So for those of you that are starting out, I want you to know this. The time, energy and effort you put forth now IS going to pay off later. I promise you that. You will make your first sale. You will make your 2nd sale. You will make your 100th sale…
But you need to make a promise to yourself, you will give yourself the time to achieve these goals and you won’t be so hard on yourself in the early stages. Building a website is a big success, creating content, getting engagement, learning wordpress, meeting people, getting help, helping others...these are ALL successes that will add up in the bigger and broader scope of your business. ;)
I would love to hear all of your thoughts on the “first sale”, whether you have made your first sale or you are still working towards it. What is your perception of this and how does it impact the way you behave in terms of the process of creating and growing your business?
I look forward to hearing your feedback.
Recent Comments
287
Hey Kyle!
It was back in 2012 when I earned my first couple pennies online! I didn't know I did because it was so exciting having a website and building content that I didn't really care about the money at the time.
All I was interested in was creating something that I was passionate about!
Cheers,
Kendrick
Awesome, passion fueled businesses tend to be the ones that become the most successful and have the most longevity. :)
My first sale was from Amazon thanks to a friend on here,she ended up buying something tennis from my site.I am going to spend more time learning the training,as and when I can.Happy Christmas to you and your family and also Carson and his family,please send on my regards and tell him I wish his son Kai well for the future.
Happy Holidays.
Thanks Kyle.
My first sale was within i think 24 hours after posting a Clickbank affiliate product on a traffic site. I was thrilled, and thought I was on my way. Nothing else happened after that with clickbank, oh the hours sitting placing links on traffic sites until I realized I was marketing to others who only cared about getting their credits, not in actually buying anything. It was the wrong audience.
Amazon has worked better for me than clickbank or any other affiliate products so far, but the lessons learned were useful.
Getting the web site going and learning to build content and deliver value while applying what we learn here is priceless if we are patient and consistent.
Appreciate your stories and experience.
Jim
Still waiting for the first sale :)
And I have struggled a little last three days but this post gave me more positive thinking :)
Inspiring Kyle thanks man
I made my first sale way back in 2008. A few actually, and they were all generated via travis sago's Method bummartketing and the Excitement was truly Gr8... For the new guy's... I gave up IM for life dificulty's for right up until NOW!
But what I want you to know is : All my efforts of bum marketing continued to generate for me approx $100 buck every fortnight right up until ezinearticle's lost search engine traffic.
2016 WIll be a Hum dinger:) Love WA
Yeah, the game changed quite a bit over those few years in terms of what worked within search and why it was working. StreetArticles was a massive hit for a few years there and then Google decided it didn't like catch all style sites (and for good reason).
They want niches sites that exhibit expertise on a topic, these types of sites have always done well and will always continue to do well.
"They want niches sites that exhibit expertise on a topic, these types of sites have always done well and will always continue to do well."
Precisely. The Game changes so quickly and we all all need to realize that, and try your damned HARDEST to not get sidetracked to the next big sounding offer? Go WA whitehat SEO all the way..
That first sale feels incredible - pure excitement!
This is a terrific post Kyle, and 100% true.
... and Thank You so much!
Wonderful sharing Kyle,
It is great to hear that all of our hard work and effort that we put in now will reap rewards in our future. I am Thankful that I finally opened my eyes and saw Wealthy Affiliate just over 6 months ago. Although I made my first online sale 6 years ago I learn here every day.
Thank You & Carson for creating Wealthy Affiliate University, to the Community for beings so supportive, knowledgeable and sharing & to my sponsor here at WA who I still to this day do not know for certain who He or She is. (I joined WA thru a silly traffic/social media share site - Saw the WA sign up page and the rest as they say is history)
Merry Christmas Kyle & Entire WA Community of Friends,
Tony
Hi Kyle, I'm 64 yrs. young and started working on my website in January 2015. I new nothing about building a website or computers or online business. Here at WA with your help and the WA community I have built a website I'm passionate about and I have learned so much it makes me excited about my future. There hasn't been a sale yet but I'm confident that I will as long as I keep adding exciting and engaging content the sales will come. Here's my site if you get a chance to check it out allaboutharmonics.com
Thank you for everything!
Have a blessed day!
Larry
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It was freaking awesome when my first referral followed me here on WA and went premium! To bad he left again, but he learned to set up his website here, and to monetize it, and it's for him a great success, it is still up and running! http://primehealthsolutions.org/
I am so proud I guided my first referral to WA make his dream come true!
Yeah, that is awesome. I remember working with Adam on their site and they are definitely off and running with their business online. Lots of amazing success stories and long term businesses are going to be created here at WA in 2016, that I can assure you of (and we are going to continually make it easier to do so through new innovations/improvements).