KhalidsLife.com

My last blog post was 6 days ago, which is terrible really considering I’ve generally been posting every two days. Lately I’ve barely had enough time to sleep and as a result, the blog suffered. My apologies, here’s what I’ve been doing…

First off, I completed changing the ad codes for all the tattoo sites so the new owner could start earning. It wasn’t a case of copying and pasting so it took a good few hours. In addition to that I am working on building a piercing network for him which was included in the sale.

My friend Stephen and I started our own cleaning company, Edinburgh Clean. After two nights of flyering properties late into the night, we’re now receiving calls etc which is keeping us busy. It is difficult to get a reliable cleaner in the city and with everyone now in the 9-5 rat race, we’re providing a service that is in demand.

In addition to that, I have outsourced two new projects which I will be launching soon. One is just a small site similar to my name generator Cool Nicknames, the other is a social media application for a specific niche that will require a large chunk of investment. The market is untapped in many ways so fingers crossed it’ll work.

Whilst juggling those 4 things, I’ve been trying to spend time with family and friends. Did I mention I also work 37 hours per week?

…this will either make me or kill me, I hope the latter is never an option!

Good luck with your persuits,

Khalid.

Yesterday I posted a story my father told me relating to entrepreneurship, The Price of Rice. I had a few interesting comments that highlighted how my fellow entrepreneurs/readers think like business men/women.

Bob - “One thing that came to mind was Adam is cooking the rice before selling it which would make it weigh more than Akbar rice.” - I never thought of this and don’t know any retailor that cooks rice before selling it but good suggestion!

Aaron - “Perhaps Adam is selling a larger volume of rice which decreases his cost price. ” - Econonmies of Scale would allow for this, but in this story, the prices are controlled by the government so unfortunately it is not correct. Thanks for your submission though!

Luke - “Adam is using the method of drawing customers in using a cheap price and making them buy others things from his shop, just like some of the big boys do now!” - This is a possible answer (not the answer I have), well done!

Anand - “Adam gets his investment very fast so he does not pay any rate of interest. He is building a customer base and also making their mindset that everything is cheaper which might not be” - This could be an answer but there was no mention of interest or loans so unfortunately it is not correct. Thanks for your submission though!

The answers you supplied are all plausible generally, but for this story the true answer lies here:

“Both shopkeepers bought rice at 10p per kilogram in 100 kilogram sacks“

Adam’s answer to Akbar’s question - “Once I have sold all the rice in the sack, I then sell the sack“.

Good luck with your persuits,

Khalid.

The following story was told by my father and is a mini test to see if you have an eye for entrepreneurism.

In some Middle Eastern countries, prices of certain commodities are controlled by the Government. Years ago, in a small town, there were two convenience store shopkeepers - Akbar and Adam. Both shopkeepers bought rice at 10p per kilogram in 100 kilogram sacks.

Akbar sold rice at 15p per kilo, netting him 5p for every kilo sold. Adam, a Jewish business man, sold rice at 10p per kilo, cost price.

Adam’s queue was out the door and along the street whilst Akbar’s custom was far less. Akbar said to Adam “If you are selling at cost price, how do you make money?”

Can you answer the question? If so, leave your answer in a comment.

Good luck with your persuits,

Khalid.

The Rise and Rise of Kortaz.com

When I first began building sites for profit and dabbling in ppc revenue methods like Google Adsense, trickles of income began coming my way. My problem is that I become wrestless, I don’t like to wait. That trickle could become a stream, then a river and so on and so forth.

I wasn’t prepared to wait, and my first network of sites were sold for $50 each.

A lot of learning has occured since then and I now follow strict personal rules when considering selling a site. I plan for the future, I think about the short and long term gains and I don’t sell until I am sure I either need the cash or want to exit the market.

Proxy traffic is considered “trash”. Proxy users are generally people who want to bypass school filters, view adult content or get away with playing their favourite arcade game at work. The only company willing that offers good revenue and is willing to allow placement of their ads on proxy sites is Google Adsense, a network which I was banned from about a year ago.

Aside from Google, there’s Adversal and Adbrite, but both offer low payouts. Adversal did provide a few extra dollars per month for their non-intrusive pop-under ads so it is a network I’d recommend.

Getting a little off track, I bought Kortaz.com for $15 simply because I liked the name. Kortaz was originally a big site divided into smaller sections, including an arcade, funny videos feed, proxy and image host. The idea originally came about when I saw arcades making, say $10 per day, a video site $20, a proxy $5 and so on. I thought about combining them to create one large site that would generate revenue through each section.

Unfortunately it was difficult to market without a big budget, I hadn’t really thought it through properly, but being a businessman involves learning, so I’m glad I made the mistakes.

Knowing I could profit from proxy traffic, as I did by building and selling SneakOnline.com for $750, I turned my sites back to the trash nobody wanted (apart from us profiting proxy webmasters). I was bored with a proxy site as you couldn’t do much in the way of earning money, so I thought about a proxy listing site.

I didn’t want one of these topsites nobody visited, so I managed to find a free script that offered something more unique - a links lister with sections and a hit counter for each link. The only change I made was to randomize link orders. Kortaz, the web proxy list was born.

Originally I offered free placements to all and a few lucky people were “Featured” (premium placement) for free. A link back to Kortaz with the anchor text “web proxy” was always required on the homepage if you requested a free link.

As the number of submissions and backlinks grew, so did traffic. The hit counter beside each link, along with a few testimonials, was proof to webmasters Kortaz provided great traffic, all for $6-$10 per month (I changed the price to attract people during difficult times).

I managed to profit here from two things. The first was that links rotated randomly so each featured and non-featured link got time at the top of the pile in their own sections. Secondly, there was some negative press about the biggest proxy listing site, proxy.org, using bots to imitate traffic and click on Adsense units of sites listed on the site.

However, as the site grew, so did the problems. The script was designed for heavy use and would max out after 2,000 outbound hits, I couldn’t integrate automatic Paypal payments and so on. I managed to hire a great coder for $50 who developed the site as you see it today using a free web template (why waste money if you don’t need too!).

The new design was rolled out and I put some contextual advertising and Adversal popunders on it, afterall it was “trash traffic”! I managed to get the stage where the site was earning around $150-$170 per month. It was doing well and I had a small money-maker on my hands.

Traffic was excellent, with the site ranking first in the SERPs for “Web Proxy” and on the first page for a number of other terms. This was simply due to the high number of relevant backlinks accumulated over time (slow but steady link building).

My reason for selling - I needed cash, I have student debt and bills to pay. I was sad to see it go.
I decided to list the site on Sitepoint.com with a price tag of $2k. I didn’t think it would reach this because nobody likes proxy sites but I was surprised it was sold within 48 hours. I think I could have gotten more but you learn. I think the strongest selling points were the SERPs positioning and the private link sales, i.e. no reliance on an ad network.

Building, establishing and maintaining Kortaz.com was one of the best experiences I’ve had online. I turned a domain name into a profitable website, I learned about SEO and link building and I tasted success.

One man’s dirt is another man’s foundations and Kortaz.com was exactly that. The owner didn’t want the domain and a lot of webmasters don’t like proxy traffic. I took two negatives and turned them into a positive - all in under one year.

I hope you learned a little from this story, good luck with your persuits,

Khalid.

I guess you are all wondering what happened to my entire blog, all the posts and content? If you are new to KhalidsLife.com you may not be aware that my blog had diminshed to nothing. Well, in a nutshell, a hard drive failure and no backups despite being told by my previous hosting company that they take daily and weekly backups.

As a result of the failure, disgusting customer service and a lack of faith in any future support I may receive from the hosting company, Host Nine, I decided to move hosts and start again. So here I am, back at square one. Understandably, I was angry and upset I lost everything, but there’s no point crying over spilt milk and some onus was on me as a webmaster to take my own backups. My full review here explains it all.

Today

I am not with a more reputable hosting company who have given me fantastic support so far and are always willing to go above and beyond their regular duties to help. I’d recommend Liquid Web to anyone who is in need of a reliable host with excellent support.

The Future

I am constantly working day and night, before and after work, even during my lunch break, to build my websites and help them grow. These investments are long term and I have no plans to sell them in the immediate future. My aim is to build three revenue streams each generating £50 per month profit. Everyday that target nears closer to reality. Upon achieving it, my plans are to double it and continue with my entrepreneurial persuits until I reach my ultimate goal…to live off my website earnings.

Stay tuned for more updates shortly. Subscribe to the RSS feed by hitting the big button at the top right hand side of the blog below the menu links.

Khalid.