Archives for March 2010

Making Money Online & then Quitting School

by Melvin · Mar 27, 2010

There’s usually a trend not just in online space but in the business as a whole. And this is usually when a kid, or basically just a young person starts becoming successful (making tons of money is included in that of course). What happens most of the times, is that that young kid quits school and goes his own way. Does it sound surprising? No!

For the last couple of month, last couple of weeks specifically, I’ve been into probably the busiest, most exhausting days of my college life. I am a graduating student and I’ve never really like gave everything in school. Even if its exam or just any subject, I never had any day where I was not able to do what I really want. Of course until now.

Just a wrap up of what craziness happened the last few weeks, it includes the agonizing process of developing a software, then the super duper lengthy amount of paperworks that comes with it, then all the meeting and then the revision and then the defense. Do take note, that is just one subject. How about the others where we have a project, exams, stuffs, just craziness.

And it surprised me that I can’t even afford to login to the dashboard page of this blog. I can’t do a lot of the usual things I do in a day. Seems like all I can do is the school work (and tweeting of course)

Quitting School

Let’s go back to the main topic of this post. If you are into this niche, you could easily realize that most successful marketers/bloggers never really finished college. Instead they quit and stuffs.

To tell you honestly quitting school when you are making good money (or even just some money) is not a hard decision to make. I mean who cares about school anyway? I’m always like “hell Im going to school this month and I would then make lesser money as oppose to I’m not gonna go to school and I would triple my monthly income when I go to school”.

The only thing worth considering are the outside factors. The factors that doesn’t do anything with all the benefits that you get to enjoy when you quit school. Like for example is your parents. I don’t know about you but if I’m quitting school today (or even before) and say to them Im making enough money, then they’d still be upset. Why? Because of the degree that you’re going to miss out.

I know having a degree is probably one of the many overrated things here on earth but a lot of people just value that. Not having one is just like not having a future life.

Another good factor is your friends, your enjoyment and attachment with them. I would be the first one to say that I go to school mostly because I want to see my friends, have a talk with them and do our craps all together. And if I quit school right now, then I don’t think I would see them anymore for maybe the next few months (seriously!).

There are endless factors when it comes to this and it includes, financial stability, security, freedom, values and cultures that you are used to and etc. And its important to weigh them all down equally before making a decision. It wouldn’t also harm to seek out advice from people you trust.

Lastly, quitting school is ALMOST synonymous to having your own business, doing your own thing in future. Because of not having a degree, the chances of you, getting employed becomes smaller. Of course anyone out there could disagree and give me twenty-five reasons why its not the case but I’m pretty sure that it applies to majority, if not all. In short, you’re taking the risk and you’re less secure.

Am I Quitting School

Heck, no is the answer! As I’ve said, Im going to graduate one month from now and If I am about to quit then its the most stupid decisions I am going to make.Maybe if I have stumbled upon that thought 2 years ago, but now? Definitely not! 😉

School has taught a ton of nice values to me, enabled me to become who I am right now, helped me be with equally talented people, brought me experience I could never forget, hooked me up with pretty girls, got me with cool persons, party casinos, sports, drinking sprees and etc. Even if I was making $1 million 2 years ago, I probably would’ve still not quit, or maybe I would. 🙂

It’s Not About Making Controversy, It’s just Being Me

by Melvin · Mar 17, 2010

If you’re a long time reader of this blog, you probably have seen me a lot of times really go into a certain topic and just write on it freely, most of the times really pouring in a lot of immature controversial statements as oppose to just being balanced enough and having a milder take on things.

But it’s just recently that I’ve been quite getting some flak for that attitude and that lead to me writing this very interesting post about my take on things.

It’s not Being Controversial, it’s just being me

I don’t think a lot of bloggers have this attitude but when I write, I just speak myself out. I try to be as spontaneous as possible and I think it speaks very well on how transparent I am. But that doesn’t mean that I am being irresponsible. Obviously when you write based on how you feel, you’re most of the times wrong. And that’s what I try to avoid. I can always assure you that I do my research or own study before really speaking on things. For all those people out there, it’s crucial. If you don’t do your research first, it may ruin your credibility.

Back to being transparent, I think most people here have liked my spontaneity and personality. That being said, it’s equally important as well to try to connect to your readers by just being your own. Sure at times we feel quite pressured not to sound too personal (and quirky) fearing to lose our credibility, but the truth is what all our readers care for is our own view on things. You could talk about this, talk about that and talk about all those latest trends but at the end, our readers will only care on our own tack on those issues and that’s why they comment on the first place. They either agree or disagree.

Controversy gives more risk as a blogger

A lot of people have gone down to this path. They start a blog, and to make a shortcut or to get noticed quickly, out of nowhere they hit big bloggers/people. They try to criticize them even though it’s not reasonable, they tend to create a lot of controversy so that they can get traction in as little time as possible.

I would tell you first and foremost to avoid that tactic. It’s an old blackhat practice and I don’t think it is going to work if you do it solely for bullshitting other people. Sure it can yield you great spikes in traffic but unless you give people enough proof on those, all of those craps are just deemed claims. And claims are just stuffs that you should never believe into.

Striking a balance

All in all it boils down to striking a balance between both. I am always a firm believer that you can get more people to read you by just being yourself, not pretending to be a lawyer or what. On the flip side, more people will actually then BELIEVE you by doing your research, thus boosting your credibility as oppose to just reading you.

Striking a balance is quite a work if you ask me. Sometimes we tend to be not fair but that’s where our readers come and rescue us. I always feel glad, actually really glad when a commenter opposes to what I believe and then explains his side on the comments.

What do you think about this topic?

Start A Logo Contest at LogoMyWay – LogoMyWay.com Review

by Melvin · Mar 14, 2010

This is a paid review sponsored by LogoMyWay.com

By now, you should’ve already realized that logo is probably the most important aspect of your design. Not only that it symbolizes your brand, but also it’s the first one that your audience see when they reach your site. So for a very small space, you already get to express what your site is all about.

One of the common mistakes that I see in most bloggers is that they don’t seem to place that much importance in investing a logo for their site. And much worse is that they don’t even think it’s a necessity for their blog! I know it has been emphasized a lot but Im going to repeat it again, having a high quality logo for your site is a must. That’s the big difference between someone who is serious in his online business from someone who’s not.

LogoMyWay.com Introduction

I was contacted if I could take a look on the site LogoMyWay.com. The site is basically a crowdsourcing logo design marketplace that connects designers and business owners. Crowdsourcing here is the key. For a minimum of $200 you can get hundreds of talented designers all over the world to design a custom logo for your websites/blogs. The beauty of the crowdsourcing model is that you basically enjoy their concepts yet you’re not obligated to pay all of them. You will only pay the design that you want the most.

Going in depth, this is how the process go:

You basically register with them first, then go on and submit your project description including all your requirements. this includes all the basic stuffs such as your site’s name, your slogan, preferred style, font and the color schemes.
After that you specify the prize you’re willing to give to the winner (obviously the higher the better).
Then your contest will go live, you’ll receive a ton of entries and the good thing is you could rank them up or completely ditch the ones that you don’t like. You could also make adjustments within your contest. If you feel something is lacking, you can elaborate your requirements more.
After the contest ends you can basically pick your winner. The winner gets the money and you then receive Industry Standard Vector Logo Files that can be used in almost any application you choose. (Websites, T-Shirts, Mugs, Pens, Business Cards Etc.).

The process is pretty simple and logomyway handles everything reliably. So far I haven’t really seen or heard any problems about them.

Crowdsourcing vs the Traditional Design Process

I am fortunate enough to have my own sets of designers who do this work for me so I really haven’t done any logo contests projects before. But if you’re starting out from scratch, meaning you don’t have any connection, it would be a little bit tough to find a designer willing to do work for you. In fact, most of the designers that you can find through forums are the crappy ones as most of the premium ones aren’t usually available for work. Another downside is the high cost.

Crowdsourcing on the other hand is perfect especially if you are looking to get as much ideas as possible. And the great thing about it is you’re not committed to pay those people to take time and do designs for you. You just pay the best design, no questions asked. I’d highly recommend this model to you especially if you’re starting from nothing and have no connections at all.

Final Thoughts On LogoMyWay

Overall I can say LogoMyWay.com is a pretty decent crowdsourcing site. The only other site that I see competing against them is 99designs.com w/c is more established due to the fact that it has been in the business for a long time.

The one key advantage that I see in using this logo design company is that it solely focuses on logo and for me it’s always a plus to be with a company that specializes in only ONE thing.

In terms of quality of logos, just by browsing the current logo contests you can rest assure that the designers participating there are top-notch designers and that would be evident with the logo entries.

What do you think guys? Have you ever had any experience (both good and bad) with LogoMyWay? I know the owner would be very happy to get your insights about them by using the comment form.

Automatically getting Subscribed to Comments, Good or Bad?

by Melvin · Mar 9, 2010

For the past few years I have been quite a bit critical and open on tackling blog comments. In fact, there’s even a dedicated category of it here just with that topic. Anyways today I would like to touch on something that I know people have mixed opinion with and that is comment subscription.

One of the guys I really look up into named Neil Patel has this enabled in his blog QuickSprout. What he basically has done is automatically have people commenting on his blog subscribed to their own comments. What happens is that if Neil (or some dude) replies to my comment, I would be notified vial email that someone has replied to my comment. 88 replies to my comment would then mean 88 notification emails (I know its unrealistic).

I’ve first seen that tactic on Gyutae Park’s blog at Winning the Web where the check box is automatically checked. To be honest with you, as a blogger myself, I find this tactic insidious and annoying. Why? Because of uhm, uhm, getting added emails and probably just really not caring to know if the guy replied or not. Both of which are lame reasons as well.

I was checking my subscription to comment plugin stats and I was surprised to learn that I’ve actually had a good number of audience here subscribing to comments. I was like wow. Over the past few years I’ve realized a couple of handful things on blogging generally. Maybe replying to majority of comments is not silly at all, or maybe this, maybe that.

So since we are talking about this topic, I am going to ask your opinion about. I would also like to say that by now, I’m discerning on following that tactic where each and every one of you who will comment will automatically be subscribed to comments. I’ve realized it’s not really annoying at all! But again thats just me…

[poll id=”5″]

Please let me know what you think by voting in the poll and also interacting in the comment forms below. Your feedback about this topic will largely affect my decision on whether to use that or not.

How Long Can You Stay Nice to People

by Melvin · Mar 5, 2010

Recently I was reading a post from Rob Sutton about dealing with people w/c gave me a good idea on this post. We, as bloggers are generally nice to people whoever they are and wherever they come from. That’s why we look into each other more as peers rather than competitors. But everything has its own limit and today I am going to discuss to my experience with dealing with different types of people.

Generally when we were just getting started, we were nice as much as we could. I mean, if someone sends us an email on something, we would always respond. If someone comments on our posts, we are nice enough to reply back. That’s how we are.

Fast-forward to the time we became a bit successful and known, we know don’t have time to respond to people all the time, we are not as approachable as we used to before and it seems like we’re not the same kind guy we used to be when we were just starting. Admit it, admit it people.

Cold Hard Fact

Here’s the fact: When a blogger gets more and more popular and established, he/she becomes less nice, less responsive and less approachable. Struggling with keeping your feet off the ground (like before) is ALWAYS a factor. But there are a lot more to consider.

When people become more successful, he/she switches from socializing to more of managing and administrating. Because of the success, the blogger tries to leverage what he has either by starting a new business or by taking the current one on the next level. As a result, the blogger’s interaction with people as friends becomes lesser.

And With Being Nice

Being nice is not really mandatory. I understood this nature and that’s why few bloggers aren’t generally nice to their readers. I am a frequent lurker of WickedFire forum and if you know that forum, you know what I’m talking about.

Some people on the other hand, seem to morph from a nice person to a complete asshole. Either because of the success that he/she tasted or whatever. Do take note that is normal in today’s world. Success comes with responsibility and as we become more successful (or just by making progress) we also change.

To be fair and have a more balanced outlook in this post, it’s really hard to be nice all the time. Of course when we are just getting started, we are into this mentality of being nice or else not get noticed thing. We try to be nice to rude people. But as I’ve said it’s impossible to be, all the time.

As we get more and more positive mentions online, we also tend to get a lot of negative criticisms from some unknown people. And oftentimes we engage ourselves in bad-mouthing against them. Some even use their blog to bash those people.

I don’t know. I am nice to people, all people who have contacted me using my contact form were replied (even those annoying ones), I try to be as accommodating as possible here in this blog and that’s because I am intrinsically that way. But at some point I wonder and ask myself, how long can I stay nice to people?