Another Week, Another Update.

3K followers

5 years ago

It's a New Week (But a Little More Special)

Here's another one of my weekly updates. The only real difference here is that this one is for the week starting off a new year.

That's right, it's time for the New Year's resolutions! The only difference between these and so many others is I actually will follow through, not just plan to and drop it in a month or two.

Website Goals

My primary goal has not changed, create successful websites that earn revenue. What has changed is how I go about doing it. Here are this year's site-related focus points:

Consistency - This is a big one. I used to try to shove 3 posts per week out for each site. That's simply not an obtainable goal with 3 sites and a full-time job, not to mention family obligations. Because of this, I'd publish in spurts and my visitors aren't really keen on checking in only to see I haven't published anything in a while and then suddenly 2 or 3 articles show up in a short period. To address this I am now giving myself a goal of 1 post per week per site so that I can not only provide a consistent posting schedule that works with "real life" but that will be truly quality posts and not something rushed out or used as a filler.
Video - One of my new goals is to include video (where appropriate) for each new post. This means that some of the time I'm saving by reducing from 9 per week to 3 is going to be eaten up by the video production portion but I believe this will allow my readers to select the medium they prefer and will broaden my audience base.
Interaction - My newest website is a membership-based site and it's all about members interacting with each other and sharing information. It already offers forums, live chat, public and private messaging between members, a social networking aspect (like adding friends and seeing each others activities, etc.), and so on. I plan to make those features more robust and even adding some of them to my other sites. The more people that are active on my sites, the better.
Quality - Content is king but it needs to be of a high quality or it's just crap. Visitors can tell the difference pretty quickly and, just like me, will drop a site in a heartbeat if it's just blowing smoke.
Preparedness - This speaks to my rather hectic schedule. I plan to research 2 keywords every week for each site (total of 6). I will also break those keywords down into article frameworks (i.e. title, headings, etc.) so that I can get to work immediately when it set aside the time to write the actual posts. I set this goal to 2 per site per week as my writing goal is 1 per site per week so this gives me a little flexibility and prepares me to write more than one post per week if I have the time. It also saves me from having to rush my research to meet a goal.

WA Goals

Not much has changed here. My WA related goals are pretty much the same:

Help 5 people via Live Chat and answering questions in posts, trainings, etc. each day (Monday - Friday) totaling 25 per week.
Leave 6 site comments per day (Monday - Friday) totaling 30 per week (assuming there are that many to leave each day). I used to fret over this. Sometimes there's only 1 or 2 requests. I won't be chasing them down and doing 8 or 10 if I didn't hit my goal the previous day as it just screws up my schedule. At 6 per day I'd make $1.50 per day or $7.50 per week to cover my WA expenses (as I am a certified Commentor). That's $390 over 52 weeks which is enough to cover my $299 annual dues and a couple of domain registrations, etc.
Not worry about Ambassadorship - Don't get me wrong. I'm happy to help out. I'm just not going to worry about getting my ambassadorship back as it pulls me away from my goal of having money-earning websites.
Share at least 1 WA post or training on my Facebook feed - I always find some inspirational or success post on WA. I try to share one per week on my Facebook feed as a way to show others that WA is a legit platform.

Cool News

So, as you know, I've been working on my membership-based website. Right now, membership is free. I'm working on building a community first and then introducing pay-for access, once it's established. I'm actually a member of a few Angel Investing groups and have started getting traction from them so that's a bit exciting for me.

One of the groups is having a major event in Miami in February. I actually host their monthly virtual chapter meetings and they have offered to pay for my plane ticket, hotel and entry into the event as a thank you. As you can imagine this is a big networking deal for me and I have already ordered my business cards and plan to rub elbows with all sorts of Angel Investors.

I have big hopes for this event.

Conclusion

Goals have been set, things are happening, and I think I have a schedule that will actually work.

What's on your agenda this coming year and what goals have you set/modified to make this the year of success? I'd love to hear your thoughts on the whole process.

Also, if anyone currently runs a membership-based website, I'd love to pick your brain and see what you've found that works, what doesn't and what plugins/features you'd recommend. I'll be happy to share my insights as well.

Thanks for listening (reading),

Scott