Goal Setting Archives - The At Home Couple

You Can Just Call Me The Job Hobo.

So, here I go again.

Packin’ my bags and on my way down another path, although I have no idea what path that is right now.

I feel like a job hobo or a “jobo”, if you will. Always changing jobs, always with the new ideas, never knowing where they’re going to take me or who I’ll meet along the way. Sounds invigorating right? It is, but I find it exhausting to put time into something and then have to walk away from it.

I am currently actively job searching, because you see, the proverbial “poop” is about to hit the fan. It’s really unfortunate, because I really do love what I’m doing, home staging and design. I love meeting different home owners and the challenge that comes with getting them and potential buyers to fall in love with their homes. But everything changed REALLY fast when I realized just how unappreciated I was by my boss. My dad always taught me that actions speak louder than words . . . and in this scenario, he couldn’t have been more right. Considering how small the company is, it’s really hard to ignore it and keep moving forward. Since the day I was hired, all I’ve heard is empty promises and plans and ideas and none of it has come into fruition.

Couple that with things like a crappy salary, no vacation or benefits, 10 and 12 hour days AND no room for negotiation and I have to start asking myself what is important and what I want from my career. I’m all about paying my dues, but considering how much I have already been paying, this is a bit much.

On a plus side, I’ve gained tons of experience, I will have some pretty good contacts, I’ve pushed the boundaries of what even I thought I was capable of and I met Carrie. Our office admin/manager/assitant/phone answerer/email responder/fire-putter-outer/complaint-taker/gofer and life organizer is quite possibly one of the most talented people I’ve ever met. I have no idea how she manages to keep everything together for us, but on top of that she has another business with her husband and plans fundraisers and events. That girl is always doing something. She really is an inspiration. I’m pretty sure that the universe’s reason for me taking this job in the first place was for our world’s to cross. So I am trying to channel her energy . . . unfortunately I’m a really messy juggler.

And right about now, I feel as though I’ve got a whole bunch of balls in the air and I have no idea which one I’m going to end up catching. (Which would make me a juggling jobo? 🙂 ) I feel so torn as to which direction I should be moving in. On the one hand, theathomecouple philosophy is still engraved in my brain, and I think it would be awesome to be able to be a freelance designer, working from home, helping people like me with little or no money improve their homes and make them comfortable places to live. (My philosophy is that interior design does not have to be expensive.) On the other hand, real life and being a grown up means that I have to be realistic about money and helping to support the life that Eli and I live.

So I’m doing both. Actively job searching to go work for someone else again and trying to get my own thing going. I have made some headway though. I’ve got my design blog going . . . lovefreshdesign.blogspot.com. All my facebook pages and twitter accounts are up and running to try and get my name out there using social media. My methods are pretty primitive, but I’m learning and teaching myself as I go. And to be honest, I end up checking back here to see what Eli’s been posting in the hopes that I can apply some of it to what I’m doing.

Another ball that I’ve got up in the air is Etsy, although I haven’t been as active lately in tossing this one. And this area is a microcosm of my indecision. For those of you who don’t know, Etsy is a marketplace for all things handmade and vintage. For those of you who know me, know this is right up my alley. So I’ve got an account and a shop, but do you think I can pinpoint what it is I want to sell? Of course not. I guess I should just put everything out there and see what happens . . .

I guess this is what being all growns up is about. As Eli thoughtfully posted, I’ve recently turned the big 3-0 (thanks for all the b-day love!) and I’m waiting for my experience and wisdom to kick in. It seems like so far, it’s all been trial and error, ups and downs and constant change. The way I look at, this is as good as a time as any to start doing this. Eli and Bleecker Street Media are successful. Hell, if he can do it, so can I.

But then again . . . we have bills to pay.

Ugh, who knows. Maybe by tomorrow I’ll have a job at the Starbuck’s down the street . . . at least there’s free coffee involved, this jobo loves coffee!

Inspiration Has Worked It’s Magic Once Again

If you’re reading this, then that means you’ve (probably) noticed our new blog design! We started this blog way back in July of 2008 as a way to connect with other like-minded people who share a passion for ideas, blogging, the web and various entrepreneurial adventures.

Since then, TAHC has become something much more… it’s become OUR FACE online. If you’ve been reading this blog since the beginning (Lori we love you) you’ll know that it hasn’t been an easy ride, and even to this very day our life on and off the web remains hectic – in a good way!

In the tradition of new beginnings, we decided a new look and feel was long overdue. You’re probably a little surprised at the “non-marketing” look of the new design, but rest assured, how we market this site online was at the forefront of the overhaul “to-do” list.

Since when have done anything conventional on TheAtHomeCouple.com??

The new design was born out of the following inspirations:

We wanted the new site to have the look and feel of our apartment. So we did a custom arrangement of some of our personal items for the header, snapped a picture and gave it some “texture” in Photoshop.
We’re both big fans of typography and the magical powers of a great font, whether it’s online or in print. Rather than have a “logo” we opted for a super simple font – can’t tell you which one though!
It’s all about wood. We’re both second generation hippies, therefor have a super-deep relationship with anything earthly and natural. There’s something comforting about the thought of sitting around a wood table with friends (like at the cottage on a Saturday morning after a late night around the fire) and that is the vibe we attempted to catch with the background texture. It’s like the same feeling you get after an AWESOME cup of coffee (Jay).
Imagery is essential. Our old theme didn’t have any thumbnail features on the home page, or inner pages for that matter. All of the images had to be input manually, which was a pain sometimes. It was essential that our new theme had robust options regarding images, dynamic resizing and custom thumbnail options.

Choosing a new WordPress theme was not fun, and it took forever, but we’re REALLY excited with the end result!

You can expect the site to show a few more changes over the next couple of days, and if you have any thoughts or suggestions – please let us know!

Honesty is always appreciated (especially if you’re not a douche bag).

Cheers,

Elijah

Attracting the Laws of Attraction

law of attraction

Post Internet drama, Elijah and I have been struggling a bit with thinking positively about our current financial situation. We do have work coming in, but trying to catch up with all the bill payments we have missed is a daunting task. Focusing on a plan of action is hard, because we’re trying to do so many things at once. The chaos is terrifying and exhilarating all at the same time. Elijah came to me the other night with a potential movie to watch for the evening, “Beyond the Secret“, a motivational film outlining the steps to benefiting from the Laws of Attraction.

The movie itself was kind of corny, but the concept intrigues me. I’ve heard about the Laws of Attraction before, but never really delved too deeply into the topic. Eli and I are very big believers in the mind/body/spirit connection, so we’ve decided to make a conscious effort to employ the Laws of Attraction. We’ve starting meditating twice a day and focusing on positive outcomes. It hasn’t been easy for me, since I have a tendency to worry and fret. But I must say that I have been pretty good for the past couple of days.

For anyone else (I’m probably the last.) unaware of the theory, it is that the Laws of Attraction are Universal Laws that are based on the energy of the earth and of us as human beings. Basically, by focusing your energy on your desires or dreams, you are manifesting them into reality. But it goes both ways; focusing your energy on negative outcomes or scenarios can attract those as well. By simply knowing what you want, asking the universe for it, visualizing your self with it and allowing change, we can achieve any goal or dream. In terms of science, there are those who don’t believe it is possible for one to transmit their energies, yet others argue the laws of Quantum Physics, which teaches that nothing is fixed, we and everything on this planet are vibrating balls of energy have limitless possibilities.

(This is my basic understanding of Quantum Physics and the Laws of Attraction.)

I figure that because we have a lot to turn around, it is easier to focus on smaller, more attainable goals. Obviously I want to get caught up with our payments, so I envision myself paying the bills and having money left over. Simple and yet such a happy thought . . . sigh. We haven’t noticed any dramatic change so far, but that can be expected since we only started talking about this a couple days ago. (Although Eli did receive a random $25 out of the blue tonight.)

I’m really excited to get my mind and body on the same page, they’ve been at odds with each other for a while now.

There really can’t be any negative outcomes . . .

because I won’t be thinking about them.

Stay Classy,

Veronica

At Home Freedom: Stop Thinking And Start Doing

Ahhhh… At home freedom. Sounds great, doesn’t it? The truth of the matter is that now more than ever people are desperate for a lifestyle change, especially one that allows them to have freedom of time, finance and location. I mean, who doesn’t want more time to do what they want? Who doesn’t have dreams of one day being free of debt or being able to travel this (still beautiful) planet without worrying about financial or career restraints? I do.

Every fu**ing day.

But here’s the problem: 80% of people who have these desires for change and prosperity spend most of their time thinking about an ideal lifestyle, but if you’re constantly thinking and reading about it – when will you actually have time to do it? Here’s an example of what I’m talking about:

Everyday after work, for the last 2 years, Joe Blow comes home and turns on his computer. He goes to the money making forums to check the action on his favorite threads. He’s always the first to order the latest “cash cow” hard copy from some guru-schmuck on Amazon.

He spends at least 3 hours a night absorbing methods and reading what other people have done/are doing. He hates his job. He can’t sleep at night and for the last 2 years he’s been waiting for his time to come.

The at home freedom. It’s gotta be out there, somewhere…

I don’t want to pull your pants down, but I’m sure some of you reading this fall into Joe’s scenario quite comfortably. You’re so caught up in the “idea” of the dream that you’ve accomplished very little towards actually making it a reality.

I get emails all the time from people asking me how they should get started with this, or if I have any suggestions for that. To be honest, most of the questions I receive can and have been answered 3743 times elsewhere online, but for some reason they assume I might reveal an untold truth – which is fair enough. And almost everytime I end with the same thing, “The best advice I can give you is to just write down your goals, the steps required to achieive them, and start doing the necessary actions to complete these steps little by little. Stick with it, and before you know it you’ll be where you want to be.”

I can’t stress this enough.

You have to start DOING. Once you start DOING you have to KEEP DOING. If it isn’t working, figure out why and DO IT DIFFERENTLY. Stop thinking, start DOING and fucking stick with it! Success is inevitable.

Let’s take me for example… Back in October I was not seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. I had been out of work and struggling to make ends online for over 4 months. My bills were past due, we were eating like shit and though I made a few bucks flipping websites, it was not coming together.

I was about to sell this blog, cash out and call it a day.

9 months later, in April to be exact, I cleared almost $4000 in profit, which enabled me to pay for a nice 1 week vacation to Vancouver – in cash – with enough money in the pocket to live like royalty for a week and get drunk with the SuiteJ clan.

Still waiting for the video footage.

Back in October I was spending way too much time thinking about how I should be doing things, instead of actually doing them, making mistakes, and doing them better. I was caught up with the success of those around me, instead of enjoying my own small victories.

Anyways – I really hope you guys get what I’m saying here. Anyone can do anything. I don’t care if you have a mortgage, 7 kids, 3 husbands and a midget housecleaner who you pay in peanuts and paint chips; the real at home freedom is there for the taking. Spend less time fucking around on Twitter and more time working on your goals. If you aren’t sweating then you’re doing something wrong.

I’m not kidding!

Assess your scenario. Write shit down. Develop the steps needed to accomplish them and DO IT. Whether it’s making $100 a day passively through a network of Adsense blogs – do it! If you want to flip websites for cash and be a pyjama pimp like me – do it! There is nothing stopping you but you.

I know I’m ranting, but so what. It’s the truth and you know it.

Cheers,

Elijah

Crazy Super Flip-tastic Follow Up

For those of you who can recall April started off with me setting an obscene goal for myself: to flip 20 websites in 30 days. Almost all of you crazy people responded with genuine encouragement and rooted me on via emails and comments on my Sitepoint auctions – and it was much appreciated! All in all, April proved to be many things, and a overall success is definitely one of them!

So without further delay, let’s get right into the stats, the screen shots and the challenges I faced throughout the month – as well as the many lessons I learned. You guys and gals know I’m not a fan of bullshit people with bullshit screen shots and claims, so be assured that all earnings and screen shots are legit and no figures have been tampered with in any way shape or form.

Total Earnings Minus Paypal Fees

As you can see in the screen shot to the left, I had a total of $3566.79 in earnings, minus the Paypal fees. Note**this total does not include a few Hostgator sign ups I had via my site flips. This total is also in US dollars, which is irrelevant to me.

Total Expenses

After subtracting my expenses from my earnings above, my new total of net earnings for April comes in at $2990.15 USD. That equates to a total of $576.54 in expenses. This includes domain name purchases, content outsourcing, listing fees etc…

Total Subscribers Gained

Another contributing factor to my massive success was due to a list building element I’ve incorporated into my niche website business. I gained 26 new subscribers in April, all of which signed up via a link at the end of my auction copy – this brought repeat business. This was pretty sweet!

Here’s a little tidbit of information I thought you guys might like to know: At the beginning of each month, and April in particular, I absolutely freak-the-fuck-out thinking to myself, “what the hell am I doing?” “what if this doesn’t work” “what if people don’t want my websites or services?” “what if it all ends today?” and at the ending of each month I come to realize that I earned more than I did the previously.

I’m sure I can compile several logical reasons as to why I go through this each month, but the reality of it is that I actually do know what I’m doing, and that there is a demand and huge market of webmasters, both experienced and flowering, who find my website packages and services very useful and economical. Will realizing this prevent me from freaking out in the first week of May? Probably not, lol.

Anyways – Here are the totals for the month regarding the actual amount of websites I built and sold:

15 sites developed/sold
5 sites developed privately
10 sites sold on Sitepoint
2 sites re-listed which didn’t sell initially
5 more private site builds for May (sweet!)
$3546.02 in profit (Canadian Dollars)

So all in all, it looks like my site flip madness was a success! Truthfully, I can only see this business model becoming more efficient and cost-effective. Think about it… I sold my first website back in September, when I was broke and we had no money for groceries. Now, 8 months later, I am making more money monthly then I did as an insurance broker, I am working from the comfort of my home – and I have more time for myself and my relationship with Veronica, my friends and family.

So I ask you this: What is holding you back? Is it time? Is it money? Is it your own apprehension?

Whatever it is, I encourage you to sit back and evaluate your situation. I encourage you to really shoot for the stars, stick with one business model and work it until it is a fine-tuned machine. Will I be flipping websites forever? Probably not. Will I continue to kick ass online and take names? Fuck yeah.

Whatever is holding you back, you need to identify it and come up with a sound plan to work around it and start to take the necessary leaps required to work from home and make money online.

Cheers,

Elijah

Blog Report For October 2008

Yes indeed – I’m back from the dead! The end of October marks the three month anniversary of our beautiful blog, and all you beautiful people who actually read what I type into this little window every now and then. I’m still amazed by that! For those of you who I don’t talk to outside of reciprocal commenting, October has been an insane month from every angle possible. I’ve faced some of the hardest challenges online over the last 31 days and it’s really showed with the lack of posting – and for that I want to apologize.

On the same token, October showed a trim down of posting on the majority of blogs within my social network, which means that all my ninjas in The Bloggerhood have been super busy either preparing for Christmas traffic, or just trying to end the year with a real bang! Everyone I talk to on a daily basis has multiple projects going on simultaneously, and let me be the first to say that some of these projects I’ve been hearing about are absolutely groundbreaking!

The blogosphere is about to change my friends, and there is a serious movement happening right now. A movement of Average Joes and Simple Suzies that are about to knock all the high ranked bloggers out of the park. I am seeing this movement form right before my eyes everyday, with every email I read or every phone call I get. Things are starting to click and it’s an honor to be a part of this.

October was a pinnacle month for my career online – and I’m now calling it a career because I’ve officially made enough income to report on, so I don’t see myself getting a day job any time soon providing things continue as planned (which they will if I have anything to say about it!) Now I don’t plan to report my earnings every month, but with this month being a milestone I felt it would be appropriate.

Traffic

Now unfortunately due to my severe shift in posting, link building and commenting during October, there has been a decline in traffic compared to last month. I’m not worried at all because I know why our traffic didn’t continue to rise and I also know what needs to be done to bring those numbers back up. Here’s the breakdown not including today:

1379 unique visitors
3527 number of visits
11171 pages viewed
113.77 average daily uniques

Subscribers

As always, Feedburner is fucking up right now and giving me an error 500 when I click on sign in, so I won’t be able to report the exact sub numbers for October. What I can tell you is that last time I checked, which was about 2 days ago we were at 103 subscribers which is a huge increase from the 67 subscribers reported at the end of September. You people are all amazing and I want to make sweet love to each and every one of you. Dudes can substitute the sweet love making for a cold beer and a high five.

Earnings

Time for the bread and butter. As I’m logging into my respective money receiving accounts I can’t actually believe I just typed earnings into my blog, within a blog report post. To think 12 months ago I didn’t even own a blog, or know what an <h1> tag was – it’s a beautiful thing! For the month of October my main focus was developing, establishing and selling start up niche sites. Most refer to this process as Site Flipping. The whole movement of flippers online is really amazing when you think about it – rather than people writing ebooks that teach people how to make money, they’re building niche sites that make people money! I also had a record month with Adsense, by fluke, because a gentleman whom I sold a site to has refused to change the Adsense code out of apparent laziness! This can happen with site flipping, and can be rewarding!

Site Flipping – $1021.00 (6 websites)
Adsense – $16.73 (getting closer to my first Adsense check!)
Clickbank – $27.00 (1 sale)
Amazon – $0.00 (some assmunch returned something)
Pepperjam – $0.00 (because I haven’t earned anything, I get rejected for every decent campaign. Doesn’t make any damned sense!)
Neverblueads – $1.00 (got one lead!)
Prostitution – $13.74 (some old lady paid me to tie her shoe and touch her boob)

Upcoming Projects

I can’t be too specific on my ninja projects for November, but sources tell me that SutieJ likes to talk, especially if you bribe him with coffee and Hip Hop. So find him on Skype and send him a Tim Horton’s gift card (Canada’s equivalent of Dunkin Donuts) and the new Nas album via iTunes, and I’m sure you’ll have no problem finding out what I have up my sleeve for this month. Even better, visit ImWithJoe.com and tell Dready Kruger that you’ve sent, via FedEx, a steaming hot Philly Cheese Steak sammich, and built a giant goldfish out of pop tarts that you will give to him in exchange for my detailed November ninja plans. All it takes is food and Hip Hop to bribe my friends. Assholes.

In short, I have two sites that I will be developing for my own portfolio this month. One of them will be a review/conduit style site that covers various niche markets – chasing after long tail keywords to catch consumers in the “buying” stage for maximum conversions. This is also known as the Conduit Method by some. The second site, which I’m super hyped up about, will be an extension of my blog/ninja skills in the form of providing my services to the webmasters/MMO market.

So expect at least one site launch in November if things go as planned!

By the way, if you’re unfamiliar or have never heard of the Conduit Method, you absolutely need to stop by TheLazyMarketer.com and take a peak at his VIP reports – no bullshit, straight to the point make money techniques that work.

There you have it. I really hope everyone had a great October, and if not, keep pushing forward! I know everyone tells you the same fucking things online “don’t give up” “keep your chin up” “keep testing things out” “it will eventually click” and the fact of the matter is that this is all true. If October was a shitty month for you, and you can’t make a penny online, it’s time to stop sleeping and get desperate. Whore yourself out at the old folks home so you can grab a few domains, and get cracking. Steal ideas from those around you, while pretending to enjoy their virtual company and talk shit about them behind their backs.

Or… Work hard and realize that nothing happens over night. Destroy that dream of getting rich quick and reach out towards like minded people. Discard your insecurities and put your ass on the line, and you’ll be surprised to realize that once you have nothing to loose things start to come together. I promise.

Cheers,

Elijah