A Progress Checkup
By
Brian Vickers Crashes at the 2008 Las Vegas NASCAR race. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Wow, 2012 is one third gone and not slowing down! What have you done so far this year? Anyone stuck with their proposed goals and actions and made progress?
Without getting into the details, looking back, initially I was afraid of perhaps finding out that I didn’t do jack sh*t and that I’ve wasted this first third of the year.
But as I thought through the goals I had set in the beginning of the year and looked at what I’m currently doing, I’m happy to report that I have indeed made progress in a few of those areas. Perhaps not exactly the way I had envisioned, but progress is progress!
First of all, as for waking up earlier on a regular basis, that had been achieved by taking morning real estate classes this past month. With classes at 9am, it has really forced me to go to bed earlier and waking up earlier. Now even though I don’t always go to classes on time (imperfect execution), nevertheless the goal has been achieved and I’m happy with that. We don’t need to be perfect. Being better and on the right track is much more realistic and attainable of a goal.
Second part of the personal goal was to detect red flags in the girls I might be interested in dating. I think I’ve been more careful about that too and so far, I haven’t gotten into trouble in that department. =)
As for business goals, the first one which was revamping the ecommerce site is under way. It is far from done but I’ve at least started playing with a couple of open source platforms like zencart, opencart, and prestashop to see which one I will eventually use to rebuild the site. Not bad, but could be better.
The second business goal was to build on the adsense blogs that are generating income and dumping the ones that aren’t. I’ve definitely let expire the ones that are stale and keeping the money makers running, but besides that, I haven’t really done much due to having a fear that I could put in all this effort and not reap the rewards because with google algo changes all that work (on 20-50 sites!) would be in vain so I’m just letting them run longer and will wait and see what I should do with them.
The third business goal which is that of networking more with people and forming mutually beneficial partnerships. That is what I’m most proud of and excited about. So far I have three projects (perhaps a bit ambitious, but they’re all good!) cooking.
The first venture here is with two other partners in a new LLC dealing with business services, one with with two international partners, involving in importing a niche computer peripheral and distributing them in the states, and the other one is real estate and finance related partnering up with one other person here in Las Vegas. These three ventures have kept me busy. Even though these aren’t generating income just yet, I can see the potential and cannot wait to get everything up and running. All of these will involve the use of internet marketing extensively along with local networking and marketing.
The forth business goal of launching a profitable CPA (even CPS) campaign is underway. I’m still testing with a new $100 google adwords account and while not profitable yet, I’m getting decent CTRs with a few of the big KWs and I will continue to tweak them to see where we end up. I’ll report more as I progress.
Feel free to share in the comments anything relating to your own progress or something relating to mine. Until next time. Have a good one, folks!
Good luck with all your ventures. Small business is the driving force for the economy.
It sounds like you have a lot on the table, good luck accomplishing it all, there is still plenty of time!
Dealing with the MFA blogs sounds tough. One algo change (as you said),and things can go downhill fast. I think this was a great strategy years ago. Today, focusing on one or two core business models that can stand the wrath of algo changes and put a more “social” face out there seems the way to go.
Hi Andy,
This year is much more progressive for me compared last year.
Mind if ask what niche in your blogs are generating income and what are not? It’s alright if don’t answer it coz its confidential or secret.
Google also hit most of the sites that I am handling last March, when they updated their algo. Many people also complained about the changed in algo.
@Andrei: There are way too many and no I would not share them for obvious reasons. It’s nice to fly under the radar with these things. I can tell you that I have a few in the automotive niche, some in finance/credit, and other niches and all are generating some income. They have taken a hit after algo changes that’s for sure. What kind of progress are you making so far? Feel free to share with us here!
Goal setting and putting actions in place to achieve those goals are very important for me. As I think about the goals I set in January for my internet business and look at what I have accomplished, I’m happy to report that I have indeed made progress on a few of the goals.
It is important to remember that not only is it necessary to look at improving ways of doing things using technology. It should also be possible to add value to existing business processes using the technologies.
Thanks for the info Andy. And speaking of the sites that I handled, not all of them are getting progress. Some gained more traffic, some did not, some increased rankings, some did not. Were still observing and experimenting what really is the effective way.
Make marketing your business more consistent. Determine the most effective marketing strategies and add them to your routine business tasks.
Well, I got married this year. :p And I started doing some freelance on the internet and I am happy.
Progress checkup is essential for the success.I used to divide them into small goals where i can achieve shorter time.So at the end I’ve achieved the bigger goal automatically.
Good idea. Although I find that sometimes it’s hard to even figure out what the smaller steps might be up front. And in those cases we just have to take the first step and figure out the rest of the steps.
Congratulations, Elizabeth! Good to hear you’re on track with your new internet lifestyle doing freelancing. Best of luck in all your endeavors.
Hey,
Sounds like you have some very good plans
Wish you good luck with all of them!
Warm wishes,
Josh
Business goal setting is a long term process and you are going to have to work at it to make it happen. It’s your business so you determine the success and failure.
When you say that the “second part of the personal goal was to detect red flags in the girls I might be interested in dating”
Wow you must be a super star! Do you have loads of girls:)
Great post, thanks.
Glad to hear you are having success networking. It has been a successful way for many of my friends and I to expand our own businesses!
Well, I’ve made some progress too. But I think, that better for me is just to not look at it, and simply try to keep ur best in anything what you are doing. Although, it’s often very hard. If you really want to do something, sooner or later you will do it … I saw it on myself not once, things of which you dreamt yesterday, can be the fact tomorrow. Best wishes !
Great tips. I started a bit late to think about goals in the year but have to say that spending even just one day thinking about what you want to achieve during the rest of the year will make your year a lot more productive!
My job has forced me to wake up much earlier than I used to. I used to work nights, so waking up at a certain time was never set. Now I have to be up by 6 every day.
With Google’s algo changes, I wouldn’t sweat it too much. You may see a dip in the rankings, but as long as your SEO methods aren’t completely black hat, it should be easy to recover any lost rankings. I haven’t seen a change in mine even after Panda and Penguin.
Setting business goals provides your business with a structured framework. It is a skill that assists the company to understand whether the firm is successful or not.
I agree with what you said here…
” Perhaps not exactly the way I had envisioned, but progress is progress!”
True, progress is progress even if it doesnt match what we had in mind, and just like you I have made a few progress with the goals I have set before the start of 2012… I am continuous working on them, sometimes it gets frustrating but quitting is not the solution, so my motto try and try until I succeed.. lol
Good post.
Hi Andy
Thanks for sharing your success. I completely agree with you; progress is progress, as much as you keep moving forward. The first and most important thing that I promised myself this year (Almost the end of the year), is that I am going to cut off every non-contributing factors in my life. That includes friends and family that have nothing good to offer. I think I am doing a great job in that department
Secondly, I promised to concentrate on one business model (Affiliate), and three monetization models (Advertising, PPC, and Subscription). I was able to get the first two off the ground, but the third one is really not that easy. I am not an internet marketer, I am a software engineer. My love for challenges as well as curiosity drove me into internet marketing.
Just like you mentioned in your article, “” Perhaps not exactly the way I had envisioned, but progress is progress!” – I’ll keep moving on
Nice post.
Hi there!
I guess those are really great news and that you’re making a big deal out of it! Indeed, Progress is Progress, no matter what! You always learn with every single experience
Jimmy – Glad to hear you got the first two off the ground! You are already way ahead of most who only dream but won’t take consistent action. Continue to be challenged in a positive way and see you at the top!
Nice blog. People are must more satisfied with themselves when they actually finish accomplishing their goals. This comes from the satisfaction of doing a well done job to the very end of the project, as well as the recognition in achieving those goals.
I always make sure to check on my progress every week, make it a habit. Read your goals, refine them and think about what you’ve done to reach them. And of course what you can do the following week to reach them.
You should use some type of online goal tracker. The problem is finding one that syncs with your calender.
Hi there
I notice that you are using the KeywordLuv plugin on your wordpress blog.
I have been asked by a client to try and remove a lot of incoming links to their website with too perfect anchor texts.
Just writing to you to let you know that you might want to disable the KeywordLuv plugin as soon as possible before the next Penguin Update from Google.
The thing is that those outgoing perfect anchor text links probably will not only damage the sites linked to – they might also hurt your own site’s rankings.
See this one for context:
googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.gr/2012/04/another-step-to-reward-high-quality.html
Thanks!
Hank
@Hank – Thanks for the headsup. Will take a look at that article!
Nice blog post. It’s always good to set goals and then keep track of them to gauge progress. Keep you motivated to do better!
Good luck with the LLC and let us know what happens with the CPA/CPS!
Good luck on your goals. We only have a month left to end the year 2012. I hope we all do have a successful business. Cheers
Well it’s pretty much the end of the year now but I think I’ve done pretty well in achieving some goals. Everything on the internet has changed so rapidly, although the big names are always there. Thinking ahead to 2013 I’ll be making some new resolutions now; e-publishing a book and continuing with my personal blog are top goals. I’d like to get my traffic up to 100 visits a day! I hope everyone has a great Christmas.
2012 is almost over, let’s set our goals for 2013. Happy holidays everyone.
Have a great a prosperous 2013 to all. Good luck
Lego Creationary, the new board game from Lego, will get
their kids imaginations flying. You can buy all sorts of different LEGO sets out there, but in my opinion this particular set IS the
Ultimate set that everyone who plays with lego should have.
On demand, the watch can also be adjusted to
one’s personal taste, naturally for an extra price.
Feel free to surf to my web blog; http://10ztalk.com/blogs/posts/SusanneGr