How did you get started?

What situation led you to learn about IM and SEO? How did you start, and what do you have to say, if anything, to people who are just starting out now?

I'm curious both as someone who loves a good story and as someone looking pointers to start making money off the internet (not trying to make it sound more simple than it is, I'm just abbreviating).

Share your story!

I learned SEO and IM, when I am in 3rd year high school.. SEO is pretty easy those days..
Lot of links.. = good ranking..
I monetize through Adsense that time..
Now, when everything is getting harder..
I am now doing CPA marketing...

My advice for you is to take action...
There are a lot, a bunch of guides here to make money..
You will get flooded by it..
All you have to do, is pick the one you find interesting (based on your skills) and Master it.. Until it work.

You can do it.. Try and try until you succeed..
Good luck sister..

I got started through Clickbank! I was already an experienced web developer when I thought about earning some extra. Now i have been making some thanks to BHW

BookBrainer said:

What situation led you to learn about IM and SEO? How did you start, and what do you have to say, if anything, to people who are just starting out now?

I'm curious both as someone who loves a good story and as someone looking pointers to start making money off the internet (not trying to make it sound more simple than it is, I'm just abbreviating).

Share your story!

Click to expand...

I got started because i was tired of working the 9 to 5 that will never bring satisfaction or gratification to my life or my kids life. I wanted to do something that had no limits and provided a good challenge, I started by making a blog and trying tones of things to make money from it, but nothing seamed to work for me for 6 months when I first started, I always seemed to find my self looking for that one great thing that would make lots of money without little or no work involved. After reading tones of posts here on BHW I finally shook what is known as SOS ( shiny object syndrome) I finally realized that nothing was going to be handed to me, witch is weird because I already knew that about life, I think that I was blinded by all the push button money marketing emails or something, but to make a long story short, I rolled up my sleeves and started working 12 hours a day and then the money started to come in for me.

I couldn't promote an offline biz i had so i started to learn from BHW and....

I was working in some hellhole factory and got sick of it. My brother showed me this forum (he doesn't do IM, but he stumbled across it somehow)

I started my IM career on January 1st, 2012. It wasn't a New Year's resolution; just a coincidence. I still work in that shitty factory and I hate it, but every bit of headway I make on my IM ventures is like an escape tunnel that I'm digging out. I'm learning and making more money all the time. I WILL make this happen; I don't care how long it takes.

Speaking of which, I need to quit screwing off on BHW and get back to work on my link building...

Great stories This is very inspirational and gives me some food for thought... Thanks everyone, please keep posting

Played at hobby websites for a few years, got laid off, lost insurance, wife had widow-maker heart attack and survived, not playing any more.

i started with data entry.. then web developing.. dropped out of college and started learning SEO(bhw). 5 yrs now on IM and making good $$$

Here is my story
http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackh...uccess-story-thanks-bhw-massive-giveaway.html

IamNRE said:

Click to expand...

LOL never knew there was a mimicry for started from the bottom

Wife was starting a website (I'm ridiculously competitive), so I started one (*not everybody's cup of tea, perhaps*), and since I wanted to know more about how to rank, I started searching online...stumbled upon this site, and the rest, as they say, is history.

I started testing and trying different things, and in the meantime, did a Fiverr gig about a year ago...I was in a white-hot niche, someone wrote an article on a pretty popular seo site featuring my gig, which drove a ton of traffic my way. I was getting more orders than I knew what to do with. Anyway, I made about $1,500-2,000 in a month that way, then rolled it into a personal site (thought I could make more than $4/sale, and I was right). I pull in more than what I was getting in Fiverr, but it is starting to cool off and I'm getting sick of it. Anyway, during this time, I started developing another site because I wanted to start an SEO agency.

I recently turned down a new contract where I was lecturing (it's complicated), and started contacting local businesses about SEO. Got about 7-8 emails expressing interest, about 1/2 were just toying with the idea and aren't serious about moving forward; signing a contract with one tomorrow for about 80% of what I was making at the college (I won't disclose numbers, but I was paid well at my last job), and I have another client that pays about 20% of my old salary, plus I have two more potential clients I've already met with a couple times, and whom I'm hoping will sign a contract this week or next.

The money is pretty crazy, but if you just spend about a year really, really learning WHILE testing it out (I've made a boatload of mistakes and I'll continue to make more, no doubt), you should be able to find something that businesses value enough to pay you for. I think the trick is to focus on something that isn't a one-shot deal, and something that has a bigger price tag. If I have a choice between spending 40hrs/wk on seo or designing logos, I'm going with SEO services.

My suggestion is, that if you don't already have a website (start with wordpress), spend the $ on a domain name and hosting, use a free wordpress template, and start doing something. You need to learn the vocabulary surrounding this field, and the best way to learn is by experimenting with your own site.

So, consider your new site a test site...learn how to buy a domain, set up hosting, play with a cms, learn how to use ftp, tweak the theme, upload custom headers, etc...that taught me so much about how a website works...then learn to do on-page seo, then move to off-page seo. What I've just shared will be the best education you'll receive.

Good luck and welcome to the forum.

EDIT: Just discovered your blog...I see what you like doing. One idea that you might want to work towards is writing a series of reviews on a particular subject that people are willing to pay for. Business/leadership books come to mind...yeah, they aren't exactly Shakespeare, but busy professionals don't have time to stay abreast of all the books in this niche. You could do a podcast and/or some videos as a way of driving traffic to your bookstore. What you could do is like a 'book review of the day', and just base it on all available information in Amazon for the book. You could do series: Top 10 Business Books of 2013, or (less popular, perhaps) War and Peace in 5 minutes. Another idea would be to write a series of study guides designed for book discussion groups...just focus on the NYT Best Sellers List, and you should have plenty of ideas.

I started about a year ago or so, probably bit more than a year.

I grew up in a good family, had awesome childhood, everything, of course there were hard times, but shit always happens, it's a part of life. After my dad died (I was thirteen than) we've been surviving, not living. I was always a smart guy, had good grades, now I'm in a good university, but when times got really tough I started bitching about how cruel my life was etc etc... Some of my friends were going to college, enjoying life, girlfriends, $$$ and I didn't even have enough money do go on a date. That was my peak, almost everything was wrong, I spent months whining but a year ago something nice happened to me. I was going to college that morning, there was some kind of news on TV and a small show about "quick rich" people, a little girl made $8 website and it turned into a $70k day business, I had no idea what IM was than, I said to my mother "mom, what if I make a website?", I was joking but I actually made one, cooking niche that was a learning experience, that's how I started. Even though I kept failing but you know, I found myself a lot stronger than I thought. I found that life has another good side, all I needed for success was hard work and positive thinking.

I'm sure someone broke is reading this right now, there is no secret to success, only two words - hard work But keep this in mind, it'll be a tough road, only 5 from 100 become successful, if it was easy, everyone would do that, so shake your ass off and change your life.

I got carried away little bit but still, good luck op on your journey, if you keep working, you're gonna face some awesome experiences.

My IM journey started at the age of 15. I was looking around to make money...'cause I always believed there should be a way other than "Going to school, after that College, after that office (9-5)". I was like - "Come on, how this Bill Gates guy made such a huge fortune? He is not a superhuman!"

I learned about it first in a computer mag. And I was like - "OMG, this is not impossible at all!". I thought it was simple. Make a site, slap Adsense on it, and click on ads by yourself. It's that easy!

Alright, so I finally got my internet connection. Note that, I solely got internet only to make money online. Thought - "Hey, I am gonna make money on the very first month! I can pay my internet bills from there!" I was so wrong.....

Now, I am into something very complicated thing. A LOT of ways to make money! "Hey, this one is good, no I think I should go for this one. No, I think I should stick with the current one....."

One year in, did nothing! Except for browsing around and learning every ins and outs of IM. I was going through a lot of personal issues at that time. Specially procrastination was destroying me. Funny thing, my life started like this -

• Finished Jules Verne/Harold Robins and many more (lol) at the age of 9. Regular read of "Reader's Digest" at the same time.
• Hit 5'8" of height at the age of 12.
• Acquired special scholarship at the age of 13.
• Wrote a lot of articles in national and international mags.
• Wherever I go, people was like - "Look he is here!"

Between 14-17:

• Can't concentrate on studies
• People starts beating me up, both physically and mentally.
• I didn't grow an inch after hitting 5'8"
• Don't like school anymore.
• Extreme procrastination and various fobias+insomnia
• Failed twice in 8th and 9th grade. Spent extra years on both grades.
• TOTALLY BROKE

Yes, I already spent 1 year reading forums and blogs and all that. You can see how awesome my procrastination was. Another reason was, sitting in front of the computer more than 2 hours wasn't allowed by my parents.

On the 2nd year, I finally joined Vworker (now Freelancer.com). Started looking for jobs. I convinced a guy to hire me for improving his site's social media presence. I was great with English (note that I finished Harold Robins lol). So he was convinced easily.

I finished my job and got my first payment of $100. I was flying in the air! But it didn't last long. I blew up all the money....not actually blew up. I bought some nice dress for my mom and sis I am still proud of that....I did the right thing. After living in a slum for 4 long years, my family's happiness was (and IS) everything that matters.

Another stop. I left Vworker for unknown reason. Note that I was broke then. Again, I started searching for Quick way of making money......

Another 1.5 years of struggle. 2.8 years lost. I got stuck with one thing.....I started writing on a mag about technical things. I started earning good money.

I came back to Internet. Uploaded funds with the help of my friend. Bought some SEO tools (I love SEO, it's actually a science for me), started providing Fiverr services, soon I hit $1k!

I re-invested, re-invested, re-invested........till I finally hit "X" figure/month.

Now, I do very little work. Only work for others whenever I need my paypal to be funded (Paypal is not supported in my country). All other time is devoted to myself and my family.

I am upscaling now. $100k/month is not impossible at all according to my plans.

Oh, and between 18-19:

• Bagged several A/A+ grades
• Re-started reading books (I don't want to be a smart guy, just want to be the guy who uses his knowledge for good)
• I can sleep whenever I want, wake up whenever I want
• Took massive action to increase my height, and finally did it...from 5'8" to 5'10" with extreme yoga and inversion.

Last but not the least, Impossible my ass!

For all who are starting in IM, BE PATIENT. It took me 4 years to be where I am now, but I never felt like, I should give up. I never lost hope. No matter how broke I was.

Cheers.

P.S. lol. That became big! If you don't like it, tell me I will delete it. I am not a self promotional guy......probably it happened 'cause I never expressed my feelings before....to anyone.

I started...

crusher said:

• I can sleep whenever I want, wake up whenever I want
• Took massive action to increase my height, and finally did it...from 5'8" to 5'10" with extreme yoga and inversion.

Click to expand...

Crusher can you give me some pointers on how you did that?

A lot of people share heart touching stories, i guess everyone has a starting point while some were lucky to
be soft pedal others has to pay for it dearly.

In 2001 i started out with surveys and one paid to answer email scheme which i later found out to be a scam.
The paid survey wasn't paying off well probably because i wasn't qualifying for most of the questionaire
so i was forced to look else where.

In 2003 i found Plugin profit site didn't do well too for me but eventually got picked up by a mentor
who gave me a strong blueprint to making money online and since then i never depart from it.

When I was 15-years old, I play online game at CC almost everyday, until I'm broke.

Then I start searching "money" on Google.. "make money" .. "make money online" ..

I was shocked!! Can't believe we can make money via online meh??

And from that time, my life was changing, from online game addicted to "make money online addicted".

I tried and learning almost every single thing about HOW TO MAKE MONEY via ONLINE.. from scam program like make money by reading email, to online mlm, seo, clibank, adsense, autosurf (you name it) . And the best part, when I started learning to make my first website.
The feeling on that time pewwww....