This post is a Dogfight (not really a Dogfight, but easy money) in reference to my previous post about Winning The Invite To Affiliate Summit.

Here is how you can win an easy $150

1. Send Mr. Cow a nice email telling him that I deserve that Invite, and let me know in the comments that you have done so, and I will pick a winner at random, and give you $150 via paypal. Please do not spam the guy. You will have to link This Post in the email to him.
2. The winner will also have to be subscribed to SOB’s Rss Feed to be eligible. And while you are at it, go ahead and subscribe to John’s Rss Feed too, you will not be disappointed, he has great content.

ps. Just made my flight and hotel reservations guys, so lets not waste it.

edit: Regardless whether I win the invite or not, a winner for the $150 will be picked.

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Our very dear friend, Mr. John Cow received a much coveted free invite to the Affiliate Summit, being held in the Sin City, in February. So, instead of just giving me the invite, he is holding a cowpetitionâ„¢ to see who really deserves it. Now, I had 2 choices

1. Kidnap his cows and ask for the invite as ransom but I was just afraid the cows wouldn’t have lasted too long with me once I got hungry.
2. Make an effort to win this competition via this post.

I am choosing the 2nd option.

For those of you unaware of the Affiliate Summit, in a nutshell, it is a gathering of movers and shakers of the affiliate world. Sure, any dumbass can throw up a niche site (<– notice the nice plug here), and make a few bucks by getting lucky using affiliate links, but these guys take it to another level. Many affiliate gurus earn in 5 figures monthly easily, which is a lot of Cohibas for me.

Anyways, back to the task at hand. What is really mind boggling is, how come we didn’t get the free invite? As far as I can tell, SOB is the closest unparody like kin to Johncow.com -

• John has his Cow, We have our Dog
• John has his Car in the header, we have our Jet and Car in the header
• John has his Milk, We have our Cigar
• John has his Milk Pasteurized, We have our Cigars solely by Cohiba (Cuban, none of that Dominican crap)
• John has his Moos, We have our Woofs
• John has his Cowpetitionsâ„¢ (Trademarked? Really John???), We have our Dogfights
• John has his Herd, We have our Dog Pound
• John is an Evil SOB, We are just SOBs

So the way I figure, if I attended the summit, in place of John, I don’t think many people would be able to tell the difference. And who better to represent Mr. Cow, other than Mr. SOB?

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Just read this article on rd.com (Readers Digest) and it listed 5 habits of successful entrepreneurs. Ofcourse, in hindsight, it seems obvious, and you say to yourself,  that’s just common sense. However, how many of those traits do you actually possess?

1. Set your sights on where you’re going: They give example of Jeff Harris, who was broke, and one day met a stockbroker at a party, and that led to him learning about stocks and eventually becoming a stockbroker himself. Reminds me of my story about meeting someone at a pool hall, who was in the paging business, and that led to my life in the cellular business. A little close to my heart on that point.

2. Educate yourself On this point they give example of a Steve Maxwell, who was an engineer, who educated himself through books to learn about investing. Now he owns investments of over $30 million. That sounds great. Most of us do that already. You are reading this blog, and other blogs, websites, books, and are constantly educating yourselves.

3. Passion pays off Here they tell us about Jill Blashack Strahan, who was broke, behind on her house payments, and the food basket business that she had was not quite as successful as she had hoped. But, she kept with it, didn’t give up, and was eventually successful enough to be named one of the Top 25 female business owners in North America by Fast Company magazine. So, are we persistent enough? Maybe I shouldn’t give up on my blog.

4. Grow your money Rick Sikorski, who is now the owner of Fitness Together, with over 360 locations worldwide, started with a 400 sq ft studio, and the money he made from it, he put it back in the business. This sounds fair, but does not always is the wisest option. I am a believer of diversification. If I am making money with one business, I will not put all my profits back into the same business. I would put back enough to grow, and use the rest to start a new venture. Maybe thats just my ADD, or maybe I just want to see what else is there on the other side of the fence. I also learnt my lesson with one of the wholesale businesses that I had, where, it was like a fat cow. It didn’t matter how much money I put back into it, my returns remained constant.

5. No guts, no glory At age 29, Dave Lindahl decided to take control of his life and gave up his rock band ambitions. He started a landscaping company, which led to renovating foreclosed homes and reselling them (flipping), and now he is worth over $143 million. This is probably something that many lack. But, that is such a poor example of NO GUTS, NO GLORY.

Reading that article made sense, however, here is what I think:

• One usually does not posses all the traits listed above.
• Luck usually plays a big part in all the successes
• Many times, success of that nature comes at a price – be it a broken relationship or broken friendships, or just not walking the straight line (you know what I mean).

I would also like to add a few more traits that many successful entrepreneurs possess:

1. Faith: I am not talking about being a religious fanatic. I am talking about faith. Be it faith in a superior being, or faith in yourself. You have to believe in something.
2. Charisma or Charm: Most successful people are good salespeople, and a good salesperson has the charm or the gift of gab to make you believe him/her. They have the ability to charm you, and finesse their way into getting things done.
3. Confidence: This one is just too obvious. You have to have the confidence in yourself to know that you can achieve something that you are setting out to do.
4. Dreamers: All (yes I said ALL) successful entrepreneurs are dreamers. You have to dream big to achieve big. Its just like when you were in school, and for an exam you studied just enough to pass, you probably failed by a point or two. But, if you had studied enough so that you were trying to get 95, you may have gotten atleast a 90, which is pretty good.
5. Adapt To Failure: We all fail. Yes, we ALL FAIL. If you want to be successful, you have to fail atleast once. You have to know what failure feels like, and to get back up, dust yourself off, and take care of business again. Someone who hasn’t failed hasn’t taken a risk in his life.
6. ALL (Yes I said ALL again) successful entrepreneurs are SOBs. Many are hated, but most are loved.

What do you think? Have I missed any point or am I wrong in my assumptions? Please let me know via your comments.

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For people who are not aware of what a niche site is: It is a basic (sometimes very basic) site with a specified niche – eg. Fishing, and the the main monetizing option is pay per click (ppc) advertising, be it Adsense, Yahoo Publisher, Bidvertiser, Adbrite or Adengage etc. The ads that are shown will be related to the niche, since the content that is displayed will be related to your niche.

Today, one of the bloggers that I read regularly, Caroline Middlebrook has released a free ebook explaining how to build a free niche site using Wordpress. That ebook is really great for a newbie to building sites, since Wordpress pretty much builds the whole site with a single click. You don’t need to know much html, and this ebook walks you through each step of building the site, along with screenshots. Caroline has done an amazing job of explaining everything from setting up your domain to installing Wordpress, to adding themes, plugins and even adding widgets etc. Granted, most seasoned WP users will not use this ebook, but it is really informative for a newbie.  She is trying to get people to use Wordpress as a Content Management System (CMS) rather than just as a blogging platform.  She points you to the sites that will help you with getting free adsense ready themes, cheap webhosting etc.  This is a great way to get started if you are strapped for cash.

The 2nd option that popped up just yesterday – Instant Adsense GoogleTime (IAGT), is a bit more advanced. This one was launched by our good friend John Cow, which is another blog which I read regularly. This one is not free but will not kill your bank account either. It costs just $29 but it offers full fledged niche websites. This again is Adsense ready, and you can build multiple sites using keywords in the admin panel. Below is a screenshot for a keyword Satellites:

You will notice that the adsense integration in the middle using the 336×280 block and the 160×600 block on the right hand column.  The other good feature about this site maker is that you can also use your Amazon affiliate id and it will display books in the left column related to your niche, and in return you will also get paid on your Amazon aff.

IAGT actually adds content on each site via rss in the form of news.  Which is great because your content is regularly updated without you lifting a finger.

I have to admit, the free option that Caroline has shown, I have been using that for quite sometime on my niche sites – Cheap Bluetooths, Ipod Stuff, Cellular Wholesale, etc.   I have been using ebay rss feeds along with Elliot Back’s rss feed plugin and something that you have to be aware with either one of the above niche building options is that it is not a get rich quick way out.  You still have to work on promoting the sites, using seo techniques, or ppc etc.  Your sites will not survive, and will not be successful just because you have built them.  You will have to put some effort into it.

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1. Going for it: “If you build it, and they will come” only works in some cheesy, b-rated movie. A blogger has to fight for the rss subscribers and the visitors. Building a pretty looking blog is not half the battle, it is just gathering of ammunition. Battle starts when you have to retain the subscribers, and readers. Bloggers run contests to grab subscribers, others try guest posting. Webmasters try link exchange or using ppc campaigns. Whichever method is used, it is an ongoing process, and there is always that extra user you want to keep on your site.

2. Networking: Your rolodex can never be full. Interact with your regular commentors and subscribers. Interact with other bloggers. Interact with other webmasters. As Harvey Mackay, one of my favorite authors titled one of his books, “Dig your well before you’re thirsty.” One great way to get noticed is guest blogging for A-list bloggers. Sometimes it is better to send your best writing to other bloggers as a guest poster. You will be amazed at the traffic and recognition it will bring you – ask uberaffiliate about his post on Shoemoney

3. Aiming Higher: There is always another blogger out there who is right on your tail, ready to take your place (Did you know that John Cow ranks #1 in Google for the term “John Chow” – which I know is not because of bad seo, but am assuming it is because Google is penalizing Chow for selling links, but none the less). Don’t be complacent. Be regular in your posts, be regular on replying to comments, and set a higher milestone.  “Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp – or what’s a heaven for?” – Al Neuharth, the Original SOB

4. Not Getting Religious Or Political: Unless your blog is related to those topics, or you are going for linkbait, keep politics and religion out of your blog. Most times, that is the easiest way to lose your readers.

5. Not Being Humble: As Neil Patel put it in couple of his posts – Talk Shit and Talk Shit II. Look at John Chow, he calls himself a Dot Com Mogul. I will bet that he called himself that even when he was just starting out.

6. Renovating and Re-inventing: Just like your content, your site needs to be fresh. Just changing the header image or launching a new theme, or just shuffling your ad placements will do the trick most times. Many times it is an excuse to make that post on your site.

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