Some New Things To Announce..
Haven’t had much time to blog lately so I finally had some free time, and here I am! Just wanted to give a plug to Lee with his new forum. It’s called EarnersForum.com and it’s for big and small time affiliate marketers to come together and swap ideas. I actually love his layout, and I’m not even just saying that. Beautifully designed and skinned. He’s also running a big contest and giving away something like $20,000 in cash and prizes for being an active member. WickedFire.com and EarnersForum.com have more of a pact because we are not in direct competition with eachother. His forum has a much more serious and professional tone, whereas mine, well, mine is meant for shooting the shit without censorship. Definitely check it out, join up, post around, and win yourself some money. Lee is a good friend of mine and an even better forum owner than anyone I know. I see only good things for EarnersForum.com in the future, and there may be some type of partnership between WickedFire.com and EarnersForum.com in the future. 
WickedFire is doing pretty damn well. For a forum less than 2 weeks old, we’ve already surpassed 13,000 posts, over 1,100 threads with over 925 members. Zero dollars were spent on advertising and promotions thus far. I’m also pleased to announce that the first contest has come to an end, for those users who got to 500 posts and 50 threads. Finally, they can get some sleep and take a shower. There will be a TON of new an interesting contests to look forward to this and next week. More details on that at a later date. There will also be a newsletter going out shortly to all of the members to keep everyone updated on industry news, things going on inside the forum, and other affiliate marketing type things you may be interested in.
Last thing to announce, and this one may cause a stir, but as I disucssed it with my partner we both feel as if it’s the right choice. There is a 50% chance that I will auction off some of my sites for a minimum price of $100k. Yes, that’s $100,000 USD. Why so high you ask? Well, the sites make a minimum of $150,000 a year, and quite frankly, I want to get out the industry they are in. Our focus has been shifted towards a very large niche network project of well over 2.5 million niches and sites. Think of about.com, but without all of the ads and crappy outdated “expert advice” content. Being that I’m no longer liquid, it would be pretty ideal to scrape up some cash instead of seeking out private investors. I’ve put a lot of thought into it, and unless our last investor decides to continue with us, we’ll be selling out. If we do sell out, I’ll be posting the site on WickedFire.com and perhaps SPF. The site will come with everything you need, if you are the buyer, to begin making money immediately. I’ll give you the server, the sites, and phone consultation on how to keep it going. All you’d really have to do is switch over the YPN and/or Adsense ads and CPA network ads to your own account. There’s tons of traffic on it already, so there’s no need to start from scratch. All traffic sources will be included as well. As much as I don’t like to sell sites, sometimes you feel you’d rather focus on a very big and longterm project instead of quick cash makers. But that’s just me I guess.
Don’t get it. Didn’t you just sell some sites to a bank for $30m or something? Why the need to scrape $100k? When you say you’re not liquid, do you mean that you already have all that money tied up?
if you are getting out of those industries, does that mean they are not performing well long term? if not, why not hold on? why waste all the time developing them and throw away 50% returns?
i meant 50%+ returns assuming you invested less than $100K to generate $150K yearly…
Just to clear some things up quickly here..
To answer Chromate: Everyone has been trying to guess the figure I made from the mortgage sites sellout. People assume it’s some insane amount of money. With that said, I actually invested almost 99% of it into some hedge funds my father and brothers had gotten into. The reason for the rush is because there are rumors that the SEC are going to try and regulate and restrict hedge funds, so I wanted to get in while I could still make loads of money from it. The payouts start in the late Fall for me, so until then, all I rely on is whatever I make from my current projects, and whatever other cash I had stashed away. I’m actually having a lot of fun this way too, really makes me appreciate the dollar more.
To answer npang: I like to focus on one major project at a time, even though many times I’ll have simultaneous ones running. With taking on such a new and large project that will take more than a year to complete on it’s own, I am aiming for a super long term goal here, something I’ve never done before, and something I want to put all of my focus onto without worrying about other projects and their day to day operations.
It’s not a question of performance, it’s a question of which project will earn me more in the long run. Something that makes me $150k a year minimum per site, with only a few sites, or something that will make me millions of dollars per month for years and years to come regardless of traffic trends or industry changes? The latter is my choice, plain and simple. The costs to develop and manage the other sites is so minimal it’s almost funny. Startup and management costs are seriously low as hell for the income it makes.
That’s all there is to it. It’s strictly a question of what’s better for my business, and what do we want to do with ourselves over the next few years. The only reason it may not go up for sale is if one of our last private investors still wants to hang on. It’s only fair to him. But with that said, since we have 1 investor per site, I think we may end up selling the other sites anyway.
Don’t focus so much on what I’m making. That’s my business. You guys should be focusing on generating cash for yourselves and keeping yourselves afloat for the long haul.
thanks for the clarification
appreciate the comments and definitely your wisdom.
looking forward to more ‘action’ here in this blog and on wickedfire!
I’m looking forward to see some of your good-money-making sites. Will they be just like the stuff you’re making for contest winners?