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I visit forums like Wickedfire from time-to-time. Most of the people there want short-term riches with little to no effort. In fact, the business I started 4
by paulhauggis 12y ago
I visit forums like Wickedfire from time-to-time. Most of the people there want short-term riches with little to no effort.
In fact, the business I started 4 years ago, which is still profitable today, came from an idea I saw in Wickedfire. Only, all of the people in the forum that tried it got banned because they wanted to do it the scammy way..and I built it like a real business and gave people real value (and still do).
Even the guy in the article seems like he thinks like a gambler and not a business owner. He makes $100K and what does he do? Blow it on expensive cars, trips, and other luxury items. He should have taken the money and created a service or software based on what he has learned from affiliate marketing. Another route could have been a legitimate marketer. He might be in a happier place now.
- JoshTriplett 12y ago> In fact, the business I started 4 years ago, which is still profitable today, came from an idea I saw in Wickedfire. Only, all of the people in the forum that tried it got banned because they wanted to do it the scammy way..and I built it like a real business and gave people real value (and still do). What was that original idea?
- paulhauggis 12y agohaha
- blumkvist 12y agoWhat's funny? You can't talk about your business?
- Scoundreller 12y agoThe poster is probably being deliberately vague, because the barrier to entry in this industry is low. If you have something that works and share it with the world, you'll quickly find yourself with 1000 competitors. They'll probably be poor competitors, but because of the nature of SEO, they just might outrank you for no good reason at all. Or the competition might bid up (at their loss, but yours too) whatever you need as inputs (like traffic sources).
- paulhauggis 12y agoWhy would I want to give anyone even a hint of my profitable niche? Many believe that ideas are worthless, but I don't. Especially on a business/startup forum. I really don't want the competition.
- BorisMelnik 12y agoIn that case, I really hope you got domain privacy in tact.
- xerophyte12932 12y agoI thought you practically demonstrated that ideas are worthless unless someone executes them properly. The idea you executed was an old and tested one, but it kept failing due to scammy executions. You gave it a proper execution and voila!
- ska 12y agoTo me, This sort of thing doesn't demonstrate their is value in an idea, rather it demonstrates the value of asymmetric information.
- johnward 12y agoTo be fair I did point out that blowing the money was an obvious mistake on my part. Those numbers don't include expenses either. Actually most of the money was lost to testing new ideas.
- phkahler 12y agoI found it odd that even after some success, you had to borrow money and look for credit limit increases. Or did you have the money and it was just that CC was the method of payment?
- chatmasta 12y agoAffiliate networks usually payout on net-30 max, or net-7 minimum. Google and other ad networks take payments on net-3 or less. So you have to float money for ads while you wait to get paid.
- johnward 12y agoYeah it's all about managing cashflow. That's how the entire thing works. Affiliates float money hoping the network pays. The network floats money hoping the advertiser pays. When the advertiser can't pay a lot of people disappear.
- timepiece 12y agoWithout being judgmental, the author has been under the influence of "Hit n' Run", "Dine n' Dash", "Pump n' Dump" on all his investment decisions and business operation. Like they say, you can get a man out of the bad neighborhood but you can't get the bad neighborhood out of a man, and this is coming from your typical low middle class guy.
- fideloper 12y agoAuthor was also a young 20-something, hardly the age in which we all make the best decisions.