Almost 15 years ago, I started to teach IT. Ha, in the beginning, it was how to use DOS, later Windows, Word, and all that stuff. And it always struck me how there were three kinds of students.
A few of them would sit back and say: I don’t understand anything. I’m stupid.
Most would just listen, learn, and do the exercises as told.
A few would listen, learn, do the exercises, and then do a lot of other stuff, thinking: What if? Can this be done?
Those latter were super-users. They would learn much more, and get much farther than the other students.
How can you use this in your online business?
You buy a domain (maybe even an info domain, they are very cheap), and you throw up a blog. Then you’re ready to test everything new, you learn about, or just think “what if…”
One of my friends and colleagues has such a blog. Sometimes his tests give a nice result. Sometimes nothing happens. The most important is that this site should not “officially” be yours. You don’t want people to come years after and knock you over the head with your early tests.
PotPieGirl tells how she always puts a new ClickBank product on her test Squidoo lens. If it works, then it’ll get a lens of it’s own. If it doesn’t, well, then nothing much was lost.
When I say a blog, it’s because a blog is so easy to set up. You can just as well have an old-fashioned HTML page, or use a CMS, or whatever feels best for you.
But having a place to test things out, even crazy ideas, is not only fun. It could make you a lot of money, too.
I am wondering: which group was I in? Hopefully not the first… 🙂
I often use Blogger blogs in that way. It doesn’t cost a dime to setup, and it is an excellent way to test money in the tip jar (Adsense) also.
Thanks for the inspiration on this blog.
Oooh, I forgot your “group”, because it consists of only ONE pupil! THE pupil, who came the first day, stayed away the second, and came back the third. No other pupil ever DARED to do such a thing against ME as a teacher 😉
But besides that, you were in the third group 🙂
Henrik, she will NEVER EVER forget that one. You DARED not come to her course 🙂 lol
Me, it is about a Magnum Mandel (Ice cream) that I ate once… never ever forgotten… (it was the last one)
Signed: Icecream loving husband
Well, he (husband) claimed he didn’t like ice cream, so when I went to the freezer to get the last one, many days after we’ve had the two first (WE), no ice cream. He then claimed (husband) that it was because he had missed me so much that he had to eat the ice cream.
So of course, I forgave him. Forgot, though? Never 😉
I’ve always avoided test blogs. I like to do everything for real.
How I get around the testing problem is this. I create a ‘low priority’ blog or product instead. That way, if something goes wrong, no-one really cares too much. And if I make sales/get traffic, it’s a huge bonus. Often I do this using PLR content.
Once I think I’ve got the process down to a tee I’m ready to go live with a real blog or product. And I haven’t even wasted my time learning.
Do you go ahead and buy .com domains right away, Thom? Or what do you do exactly?
Britt, it varies.
I’ve got a couple of very general domains where I set things up inside subfolders and they still make a lot of sense. So they’re great for products which I’m not really serious about, but am just using for learning.
Otherwise, I do grab domains sometimes. I usually end up with more than I could ever possibly use, so they don’t always get renewed. If I’m feeling short of money I grab a .info (I then regret it a year later), otherwise a .com. I also watch out for when the offers are on for domains (I grabbed one with GoDaddy for just over a $1 yesterday) and grab one quickly. So long as I’ve got a half considered project which I don’t want to spend too long working on, those bargain domains are absolutely perfect.