Want to earn your 100% living online? In my opinion the most efficient way (if not the only one) to do it is to diversify – otherwise you can’t compete with big online companies and agencies, you need some small (if not tiny) niches that do not attract ‘big shots’.

All these tiny niches combined should provide you with a nice stream of income. And it is best to run a few small projects in a number of areas:

- online service applications. Best sources for inspiration (as far as I know):

techcrunch.com
readwriteweb.com
springwise.com
mashable.com

- online stores. Get inspired here:

internetretailer.com
ebay.com
amazon.com

- content rich projects. Need ideas?

wikipedia.org
associateprograms.com
Yahoo! Answers

- PPC arbitrage and cost-per-action affiliate marketing are a nice addition to the mix

- also provide some webmaster services locally or globally: design, coding, SEO

Summary: Do you think it is next to impossible to cover all this for a single person? I am sure it is if we talk about full time job, and those who have spent in online business a few years are likely to share this opinion.

On the one hand, it seems that they are completely different, but in fat they all function according to the same rules – marketing techniques you need to promote your online store are similar to those that you will apply for your content project, etc. They are all interrelated and help each other.

In return you get a feeling of safety due to diversification, broader vision that helps you to make your projects better and more attractive, bigger income streams. I think it is worth it.

[tags]earning online, ppc, cpa, arbi, arbitrage, seo, internet marketing, affiliate marketing, make money online, earn your living online[/tags]

When you browse webmaster forums (the ones that cover AdSense issues) you are certain to come across a discussion of this kind:

Question: How do I earn $100/ day from a website, now I am making $10.00 from it.

Answer: Optimize this one or better – start nine more websites. You know how to make $10.00 from one website, so just repeat the same algo with other nine websites and earn the amount you want – $100.00/ day.

As a rule, AdSense brings more or less good income for content websites. Do you have any idea how to keep running 10 content websites with unique and preferably interesting content on your own? It is impossible. So you need some outside help.

That is what I did. After I have succeeded to make a few hundreds dollars a month from each of my websites I could run myself I have decided it is time to grow and hired a few college students to help me to repeat the steps I did with my money making websites. I have arranged a sort of a training course (a selection of the most important things and techniques to know when running a website of the kind).

Why college students? They are more affordable than professional copyrighters. So, I started a few more websites using WordPress as a content management system, hired a few quite talented freelancers and anxiously waited to reproduce what I knew how to do. Month after month the results were quite poor – those websites could generate income to cover the college student help, sometimes even less. At the start I was certain of my poor performance – the websites are new (were just a few months old when I hired the help), the guys are learning the basics.

So, one year later the situation did not change – the same guys are running the same projects, they have learned something, but the websites generate some uneven income from AdSense and text link sales and do not show any desired progress.

Summary: My conclusion is that it takes hard work to make some decent money with content projects nowadays and it takes time. And it requires skills and passion. You compete with thousands of websites in your niche; most website owners are enthusiasts who are really passionate about the topic. And you can’t hire a college student and make him passionate.

So, the above mentioned forum discussion does not hold true in my case. I might have done something wrong, but I have just followed the logic of the answer.

What is now? I run my PPC arbi tests (will certainly publish my results) and make arrangements to do PPC marketing (promoting some CPA programs), I run an e-commerce project and am going to start 1-2 more, I also have some ideas of a service website kind. So, I have some ideas about the direction to follow, but at this time I am fed up with content projects.

[tags]content websites, webmaster forums, AdSense earnings, seo, internet marketing, affiliate marketing, make money online, earn your living online[/tags]

I think my idea to clone popular websites is not original – webmasters shamelessly copy popular and trendy web concepts all the time, on all levels. Take a minute to visit a freelancer website and see how many projects include the word “clone”: need a clone of this website, need a clone of that service, etc…

I have an idea to make one more step in that direction – clone popular website concepts in other languages than English. Do you know Spanish or Russian? Or, probably, Chinese? Browse some good list of web 2.0 services (or keep an eye of new web companies covered by TechCrunch, ReadWriteWeb or SpringWise), select what might suit the market of your target country – you need excellent knowledge of that country culture and Internet scene or a local advisor (search for a partner on the webmaster forums) and promote projects on those markets.

How to monetize your websites? I think Google AdSense is a really global service now, so they will help you at the first stage. In the future you are likely to make some direct adv deals if your project proves to be successful.

I think you are likely to expect lower earnings from projects in other languages and lower traffic, but also a much lower competition as well. And you have a wonderful chance to be the first in the market in that niche.

Summary: I personally like many new web services. A few that in my opinion has a good and lasting business model:

- zopa.com
- daylo.com
- mutualwin.com
- threadless.com

I hope to start a project of this kind early this spring.

[tags]clone websites, web 2.0, seo, internet marketing, affiliate marketing, make money online, earn your living online[/tags]