admin | 
09 5th, 2009| 
I write alot here about how to generate revenue through Search Engine Marketing and advertising using Google Adsense. What I have not written about is what to do with the cash you make to ensure your future is one of wealth. I’ve been doing this since 2002 and you’d think that would be a huge pile of money. True enough, if you add up all the extra income it does make for an impressive number. What troubles me now is what I could have done with all that money that would have built a foundation for a more solid future. I view online revenue especially via Google, to be a fickle thing that comes and goes, feast and famine, and someday could just disappear overnight. So the key is to grab as much cash as you can now and then invest it wisely so you aren’t screwed when the faucet shuts off. By this I mean in the past, early on, I bought “stuff” motorcycles, gadgets and lived larger than I should have and didn’t save and invest as much as i’d like. A few years ago I did better, buying a rental property and getting out of debt. Today i’m focused on paying off my mortgage, and then buying more rental property. When I add up all the earnings from Google since 2002, while i’ve done some smart things, I don’t have a paid off house. I could have had that two years ago if I had focused. So now with a new plan all my profits go to my mortgage. I have a day job so there isn’t any reason my Adsense income can’t go to pay off the mortgage 100%. The plan is to have no mortgage as soon as possible, and then buy more rental properties and possibly other businesses. That way when the online income ends, which it may or may not, I have another established business built with my new cash flow. This from from having 0 debt and the rental property business is extremely stable in good and bad economies. If the online thing continues then so much the better, but it’s always best to be prepared for when the good things come to an end.
So tonight I started a new project focusing on credit issues for those that live in Apartments. It may or may not be well known that folk that rent especially in apartments focus on their credit more than those that do not. So my goal is to present a site on Apartment Credit that can help folks improve their credit despite the fact they live in an apartment and allow me to hopefully bid on reasonably priced keywords to get some revenue from credit based ads.
Sometimes simply creating web content isn’t enough. If you don’t mind a little risk you can pay for advertising to drive traffic to your websites. One of the best ways to do this is with PPC advertising via Google or Yahoo or MSN Adcenter. You bid on keywords and the idea is to pay less for the advertising then the revenue you gain with increased traffic. A recent example of how this works for me is my Unified School District website. I use Yahoo Search Marketing to bid on the keywords Los Angeles School District and then send them to my page about the Los Angeles Unified School District. In this particular case it costs me less to send them there then I make when visitors click the ads so the scheme works. In many cases it will not and you need to abandon the campaign and try agian. When you find winners you let them run and your income will pile up. Part of this is knowing what to publish, what to bid on and how to manage the PPC vendors. They are picky about keywords you bid on and pages you send visitors to. Keep your keyword related to the content your sending them to or you’ll have your campaigns turned off or as I was get kicked out of the advertising program alltogether. Arbitrage is a challenge to learn but once you figure it out it really juices your revenue. I’m currently spending $15k per month advertising my websites with Yahoo. So far the retuens have been well worth the risk.