A Look ahead to 2007 for Art of Money
Well I’ve spent a couple posts recapping the goings on here in terms of stats and top stories, so today I want to finish up the year end wrap by taking a look at a couple of events from 2006 and then taking a look forward to next year.
2006 Events
#1 – Real Blog Videos
Thanks to James’ mentoring, on July 27 I launched my Real Blog Videos. An information product that took people step by step through the process of setting up a WordPress blog.
Thanks to a great endorsement from Darren, I have sold about 70 copies of the videos with only 1 return and very few requests for support. Considering that my efforts to promote the product beyond the launch week have been zero, I think that is pretty good as it continues to consistently sell a few copies each week.
In general the info products creation business model is a very good one. It teaches all the basic skills of business in a small and controlled manner, which is important, yet you can still make significant money.
#2 – Home Turf Media Blog Network
I didn’t really make an official post on this site about it, although I hinted a lot, but on December 1 the pilot project for my new city based blog network launched.
After about a month, I am convinced that the pilot project has been a success even though only 2 of my 4 bloggers have really hit their stride.
In early January, I plan on launching a bunch of new blogs on the network.
This project has become my primary focus now and I have dropped pretty much everything else to work on this network. I believe I have enough money in my business to fund it and for me to live off of for about 9 months, so it’s all systems go as I try my hand at my first “Real Business” which is what I have been longing for ever since I started trying to make money online a couple years ago.
What’s Ahead for Art of Money
It’s actually very refreshing for me to think ahead to 2007 knowing that I’ll be spending all my time on ONLY my blog network and this site. I’m sure if they diagnosed Internet business people’s primary affliction it would be “too many projects-itis” and I was a big sufferer.
Getting a New Look
A month or so ago, based on your feedback, I spent some time and dreamt up what I considered to be the ultimate WordPress template and some new design ideas for the look and feel of the site. It is being coded now as we speak and I’m looking forward to rolling it out in January or February of 2007.
A New Newsletter
I decided to re-vision my newsletter to create a little separation conceptually between it and this site.
Tentatively it will be:
Fascinating Finds
Gadgets, Toys & Tools: Practical Discoveries for Making Money Online!
The format will be similar to my speedlinking posts and I think it will be more fun for me and hopefully more interesting and useful for you too.
I’ll also move it onto a more professional email list service and be sending in HTML format rather than plain text.
Contests
I am seeing more and more bloggers running contests on their sites and I really like the idea. In 2006 I held my first one to help redesign my site, but in 2007 I want to break down the barriers of navel gazing and have a real contest or two…something along the lines of ProBlogger’s group writing projects.
What I have planned is to have the first one as a celebration of my new theme, so look for it once that is online. [PS: I plan to promote the contest heavily, so if you have a product or service that you'd like to donate as a prize, let me know]
To Sum it Up
I’m not really big on goal setting, but I’d like to see some big improvements in the numbers for this site. I think 1000 RSS subscribers and an Alexa rank in the top 50k are reasonable if things go according to form for the year.
How I’ll Do It
One thing I’d like to do is to improve as a blogger. I’ve always considered myself an online business guy who happens to blog and I’ve used that as an excuse to not really take it very seriously, but I decided now that I would like to put some efforts into honing the craft of blogging.
That’s it for my year end. I hope you have some clear intentions for 2007 and I’m looking forward to your comments and participation in the next year.
Jon Symons