I thought that I would take a moment this morning to welcome myself back from vacation. I just returned from a great few days in Galveston, Texas. Now admittedly, Galveston is by no means the most beautiful beach in the world, but it is really close to my parents. We actually stayed at Moody Gardens, which is a cool resort complex on the back side of the island. The complex includes an aquarium (complete with Penguins), a rain forest, an IMAX theater, a water park, and a man-made beach. Really neat. As fun as it was, I think it is better to stay closer to the beach (especially from the point of view of my children).

Before I left, I intended to get several posts queued for release during my vacation using the cool "future post" capability found in WordPress. If you are not familiar with this neat feature, drop me a comment and I will post a tutorial on how to use it. I think it's pretty obvious, but I am happy to help if I can.

Well, I obviously failed to get posts scheduled for release. I got completely distracted with other projects that I am currently working on and will be discussing here this week. Some distractions include:

• New Experiment with Jonathan Leger's 3-way Links Product. I'll be blogging about this in the near future, but basically this is a subscription-based service that gives you one-way back links. Your subscription allows you to get 250 one-way back links per site for 50 sites. On the sites that I am testing, I am seeing immediate results for targeted keywords. More on this later.
• Redefining the MasonWorld Roadmap. It's mid-year 2008, and I a revisiting my "Internet Empire" goals to be completed by the end of the year. I have a much clearer idea of my long-term goals now, so I will be sharing those with you as well.
• Continuous learning. I have also been participating in 2 mentoring/coaching programs. I work with Josh Spaulding for learning related to SEO and traffic, and I work with Aaron Abber for learning related to direct response internet marketing (email lists and products). Cool thing is that both guys actually know a lot about both topics, so there is a llot of synergy. My goals for 2008 include having several profitable adsense and affiliate sites, as well as a couple of product launches.
• Speaking of product launches, I will be launching my first product at the end of this month (target launch date is June 30). I have developed some niche adsense themes for WordPress that are designed for high CTR mini-sites, and will selling them along with a subscription for future themes and an install service. More on this as the launch date approaches. There will be a very generous affiliate program, so stay tuned.

By the way, one thing that I missed while I was on vacation was Aaron Abber's weekly mentoring class teleconference (mentioned above). This a very cool thing each week that I always look forward to (Aaron is entertaining in addition to being well qualified to present the class materials.) There are lots of cool things on Aarons blog for free (in addition to his free mentoring program). One of my favorites is his humorous 101 Ways to Grab More Blog Subscribers. So if you want a laugh with a bunch of great ideas mixed in, check that out.

OK -- that's all for now. Look for more sunstantative posts from me later this week.

Best regards,
Mark

Last week was an exciting week. My neighborhood was hit by a tornado that knocked out power and satellite, I celebrated a birthday (I feel old) and I was kidnapped by my wife and taken to an exotic hotel location without my laptop. Working on Internet Marketing without electricity, an internet connection or a laptop is really challenging. Luckily, my BlackBerry was not impacted by this weekends events, so I was able to stay connected.

Over the weekend, I was able to get started in Josh Spaulding's coaching program. Josh is an article marketing and SEO expert (currently ranking on page 1 in Google for make money online), and a really nice guy. When I first got started in Internet Marketing, I became interested in Adsense, and quickly learned that there were guys like Garry Conn that had as many as 100 blogs -- many of which were making money from Adsense. In my research on this topic, I ran across Josh's eBook called Article Marketing Domination and his free eBook Easy SEO. Recently, Josh published another free eBook: $5 Mini-Site Formula. This book was about exactly what I wanted (needed) to know when I started last November.

The MasonWorld Roadmap

Reviewing that eBook has made me rethink the 2008 Roadmap for the MasonWorld Internet Empire. Basically, I have been thinking about what I want to get out of my Internet Marketing hobby. I started this effort in Nov 2007 with some similar goals, but I am continuing to refine them (December seems like an internet lifetime ago).

On this pass of goal setting, I came up with several key overriding concepts:

• Have fun. This is easy, since I am facinated with the internet and technology
• Learn something. This easy. I knew nothing about internet marketing when I started.
• Add some value. Whatever I do, I am not really interested in just "taking" and leaving nothing behind. A good example is this website. At the end of 2008, I would like to be able to point to this site as a valuable resource that people can use.
• Generate revenue. I actually struggled with this. I am not really in this for the money since I have a great day job (as I have mentioned a thousand times). Still, it seems like the measure of success in Internet Marketing is revenue. So, I am making this the lowest priority goal

Of course, there are some constraints:

• Limited time. I am only allowing myself a coupleof hours a day (max) to work at this hobby. My family and my real job come first (in that order).
• Limited funds. I could choose to spend $4700 on an eCourse or something like that. I am sure I could get great results that way. But, I am determined to do this the "hard" way on a limited budget.
• White Hat. I am still not interested in Black Hat techniques. However, I do see that sometimes it is a little hard to tell the Gray stuff from the White stuff.

With this as a framework, that left me with the question of what to try to accomplish in 2008.

Approaches and Goals for 2008

I am currently planning to have the following completed by the end of 2008. Of course, I plan to blog about everything that I learn in the mean time.

• Grow the MasonWorld.com Internet-Based Marketing blog
  • Post 3 times per week about my Internet Marketing experience
  • Grow RSS readership through great content generation
  • Grow email opt-ins through bonus content
  • Add a modest monthly podcast
  • Build a valuable brand with great content that people want to read
• Build three niche information sites
  • Launch 3 new sites with the $5 per day formula
  • Use article marketing to promote the sites
  • Use the Coaching With Josh resources to achieve $5/day in Adsense revenue
  • Work with a great developer to build a killer niche site WP template
  • Consider a plan to grow those sites to something more in 2009
• Build 3 Affiliate Product sites
  • Launch 3 new/existing sites (Elvis will be one of them)
  • Use article marketing to promote the sites
  • Consider a plan to grow those sites to something more in 2009
• Create my very own information product
  • Identify a niche (IM may be the first one)
  • Create an information product (Niche site case study how-to maybe?)
  • Promote and sell the product (or give it away)
• Create and release one report for Butterfly Reports

That's already way too much for 2008, given that I am working on this part time.

So, tonight I am planning on working on article marketing for my new niche sites using Article Post Robot. I bought this tool several weeks ago. I will post about my progress on Wednesday (my next scheduled post).

Best regards,
Mark

Most Internet Marketing gurus talk about the great lifestyle that is possible with web-based businesses. You can work when and where you want. You can "make millions from a hammock on the beach." That sounds really cool. Interestingly, I was even able to find a list of the top ten beaches with WiFi access. I'm not sure about all this lifestyle stuff. All of the IM guys and gals I know are working 18 hours a day.

I'm personally coming at this Internet Marketing (IM) thing from a different angle. I already have a cool day job that I like as an engineer at a big technology company. One of the really great things about having a day job outside of my Internet Marketing hobby is the potential for exposure to cool stuff. As I mentioned last week, I was in Asia on "day job business." Last Friday night I was able to go eat at a restaurant in Clarke Quay, Singapore called Jumbo's Seafood.

Clarke Quay is "historical." It's a riverside quay located within the "Singapore River Planning Area" upstream from the mouth of the Singapore River and world famous Boat Quay. Clarke Quay was named after Sir Andrew Clarke, Singapore's second Governor. (A quay is a structure built parallel to the bank of a waterway for use as a landing place - I did not know that.)

I had a signature dish for the area called Chile Crab. Totally outstanding, and highly recommended. Served best with Tiger Beer (local to Singapore). Tiger beer is nice and crisp with an easy finish. Like all alcohol in Singapore, Tiger Beer is very expensive.

I am told that restaurants all over Singapore have chile crab on their menus and that it is considered one of Singapore's national dishes. The crab that I had was a beautiful whole crab awash in spicy chile sauce. I've eaten food all over the world, and I would put that chile crab up against any seafood anywhere.

This was my first visit to Singapore, and it was not what I expected at all. Most Asian cities that I visit are wonderful in some distinctly Asian way. This city is wonderful in every sense of the word. It is a multicultural city heavily influenced by China and Great Britain. It is clean and safe. There is a ton of shopping and amazing food. The people there are nice, and all the signs are in English (my Mandarin is horrid).

I was able to stay in a wonderful 5-star hotel in the financial district. This got me to dreaming. What if I really hit it big and created a massive online empire? Then I could hang out in Singapore and eat Chili Crab. At that moment -- right at the second that I was imagining being bought by Google -- my BlackBerry started ringing and there was someone in the U.S. that wanted to complain about the latest crisis at work for $3/minute in international roaming charges.

That brought me back to earth. At least a got a blog post out of it. LOL. I can't wait to go back to Singapore.