I was reading a post over at my friend Bob Buskirk’s Blog about living the dot com lifestyle which got me thinking about my journey in this same area.

How It All Started

For me, the dot com lifestyle unofficially started January 7, 2007 at The Tech Zone CES Kickoff Party. This party was hosted by John Chow. At this party, I met several other site owners and continued to build on these relationships and develop more after the show.

Shortly after the show, I came into contact with Bob and started talking to him on AIM. Bob also runs a tech site, ThinkComputers.org which does the same thing as my site, review computer / consumer electronics products. The only difference was that Bob was making a full time living from his site, where as I had been running my site pretty much as a hobby since 2001. I was a total noob when it came to making money online and thought stuff like that was a scam. Boy was I wrong!

Bob was a great mentor to me (and still is). He helped me get set up with TTZ Media which was my first serious attempt at making money from the site and showed me that you actually can make money online (and good money). I also continued to develop a good friendship with John and a few other tech site owners / bloggers. In the online world, it really is all about who you know and what you can do to help each other out.

Once the dot com bug had bitten me, I was infected! I made the decision to drop out of school in February of 2007 to try my hand at doing this full time. My situation was a bit unique based on my disability and what I am limited at doing physically, which I based some of my decision on. The other factors included being sick and tired of school and student loan debt… all working for a degree that I wasn’t going to be using anyway. No, thanks.

The Lifestyle

As I have said before, this was one of the best decisions I have ever made. I was smart enough to keep detailed Excel records of everything when I first started this, so I have a clear view of how things are progressing. Besides the stray month or two, there has been a steady increase month after month.

As with any job, the most important aspect is that you must like your job. If not, it will be pure torture and nobody wants that. I was doing this for six years without pay simply because I loved it. Being able to do it and make money is just a perk.

Another great thing about the dot com lifestyle is being able to work on your own schedule. Me personally, I am NOT a morning person. I now have the freedom to get enough sleep and wake up at a time that I am comfortable with. No, this does not mean I sleep all day. I usually go to bed around 3-4 a.m and wake up around noon. This nets me about eight hours or so of sleep per night, which is average - I just shifted the sleep and wake times to my liking.

Not having a 9-5 traditional job also means I am free to go “have fun” at will. I am not trapped at “work” so I can go do things I enjoy like watching hockey games, going to Florida and just hanging out with friends. What makes things even better is that I can still do work using my laptop anywhere in the world that I have an internet connection. How many “real” jobs have that sort of flexibility?

So, What’s The Catch?

Honestly, there are no “catches”. You can be successful at making money online using several different outlets: tech sites, affiliate marketing, blogging, etc. But, the one misconception I think most people have is that it’s easy to do. Not true.

While I have never personally heard anyone say this to me, I do get the impression that some of my friends probably think I just sit around at home all day doing nothing and make money. Yeah, don’t we all wish it was that easy? The reality is, I do sit at home a lot, but I am constantly working. Whether it is testing products, writing reviews, answering emails, talking with sponsors, creating contests, updating the site layout / design… I am always thinking of ways to make the site better. I have worked my ass off since 2001 on the site and probably 10-fold since starting it full time. So the next time you think someone like John who makes 30 grand a month from blogging doesn’t work for it, think again!

What’s Next?

I have already accomplished a lot of goals since starting out full time, including a new design and custom CMS for OCIA.net and new software and layout for the forums.

Many things remain a constant, like continuing to try and find new ways to drive traffic to the site, toying with ad placement and different programs as well as attaining new and exciting products to review. Maintaining online friendships and also creating new ones is another priority for me.

Some of my goals for the immediate future include hiring a few additional reviewers to help with the workload and allow us to publish even more reviews. I’m also trying to help build up the forums and make them more active. Another idea I am working with is to start an entirely new venture here soon - more on that if / when it happens

Social networking sites aren’t anything new, but some of the newer ones are just plain stupid. Example: Twitter.

For those of you who don’t know, Twitter is an “update” system for your life… yeah, how lame is that? The whole purpose of the site/service is to allow you to make continual updates throughout the day of everything you are doing. You just ate a hamburger? That’s great. Going shopping or mowing the lawn? Congrats. Going fishing or simply watching TV? Hope you have fun. News flash: I COULD CARE LESS ABOUT YOUR DAILY ACTIVITIES!

Umm… no, basic updates are not meaningful. Again, I don’t care that you are eating soup, running late to a meeting or partying. If you are running late to a meeting, the last thing you need to be doing is playing on your phone, updating your twitter. How about get in the car and drive to your meeting?! And, if you have enough free time to keep an eye on what everyone else is doing in their lives, well… that says a lot about what you are doing (or more so, NOT doing).

The only thing good about Twitter? It is a stalker’s dream come true.

Now, before you ask, I can already hear some people saying, “Well isn’t a blog essentially the same thing?”. No, not even close. Blog posts are meant to be informative and entertaining. I don’t publish posts unless there is some substance to it: humor, informative, educational, etc. I gain nothing by knowing you just washed your car.

Do you use Twitter? Surely I am not the only one that thinks this is one of the worst ideas ever…

A lot of bloggers talk about building your brand and how important it is to becoming successful. This, of course, isn’t just limited to blogging, but any business model in general. I will be the first to admit that I haven’t spent too much time trying to build a brand with this blog. Doing so with a blog that uses your name as the URL can be challenging, but the main reason I haven’t done this yet is because I am focusing most of my time on my tech site.

With a computer hardware review website, the process of building your brand really isn’t different from a blog. Content is key, but more importantly here, quality content is a must. You are providing a free service to the general public, informing them of which products you feel are worth their hard earned money, and which they should probably look past. It is imperative that you give your honest opinion and relay both the good and the bad with each product.

After good content is being produced, you must drive traffic to your site. This can be done by sending out news releases to other tech sites for inclusion in their web news, exchanging affiliate links and becoming friends with other site owners.

Now that you have an initial traffic source, you need to secure a loyal fan base; people that will bookmark your site, subscribe to your RSS feed / Newsletter. These are the people that help make your site what it is, so give them a reason to like your site and want to come back. You can do this with great content, frequent updates and even giveaways / contests. Remember, without fans, none of it would be possible… or worth your time.

Once all of this is in place, it is only a matter of time before you will begin to gain name recognition. This will happen differently depending on your blog / website / business, but here are a few ways that I have done so with OCIA.net.

One thing we do on the site is award a product our Seal of Approval if we feel it is a great product that is worthy of your money. Manufacturers love it when their product wins an award and most will proudly display these awards. I have had my site’s award logo printed in company product line brochures (seen above)…

company pamphlets…

on retail product packages…

and most of all, on company websites. This is great free, targeted advertising for my website and, well… how cool is it to go into your local electronics store and see your website logo on a retail product box?

Another great way to promote your business is to print and distribute t-shirts. I sent out about 20 or so OCIA.net t-shirts to bloggers and friends across the net. They got a free t-shirt, and I get free advertising from them posting pictures on their blogs and every time they wear the shirt out in public!

If you are fortunate enough, getting your name on television is a great way to get a ton of new business. We did this several years ago on Tech TV’s The Screen Savers, when the former co-owner of the site was features on the show for a computer modding segment.

Theres are just a few methods I have used to build my brand and create name recognition.

Besides computers and technology, one of my other main passions in life is photography. I have always been somewhat interested in taking pictures, but I didn’t really get “serious” about it until January of 2006 when I purchased my first DSLR (Digital Single-Lens Reflex) camera, a Nikon D50. The main reason I bought this camera was for taking pictures of review products, but I soon found myself shooting more for pleasure than work.

The awesome thing about most DSLR cameras is that you don’t have to be a photography whiz to operate it; simply using the Automatic settings can net you some good results. Once you feel comfortable with your camera, you can start experimenting with some of the manual settings. Your camera’s user manual is a great place to start, but you can also find tutorials and guides online to further help you understand some of your camera settings, or even take some photography classes.

Once you have a good collection of photos, it’s time to start marketing them. There are several “stock” photo sites that will host your images and help you sell them. Stock photos are a bit different than most photos you will probably shoot and have several demanding requirements that must be met. These are pictures that can be licensed for specific uses and must be “generic” in form. They cannot contain any business logos or copyrighted material. If you have a person / people in your photo(s) that is recognizable, you must have them sign a model release waiver. Also, if you photos are not absolutely perfect, many of these sites will not accept them. Some of the more popular ones include iStockphoto, Big Stock Photo and fotolia.

If you are not interested in stock photos, you can elect to try and sell photos on your own. There are many ways to market your own photos, many of which are absolutely free!

Social networking sites are a great place to start. Sites like Myspace and Facebook allow users to create free photo albums. You can host your photos here and detail your pricing information in the photo description area and on your main profile page. Both of these sites also have user groups that you can join, where you can meet like-minded people and help share your pictures.

Photo hosting sites like Photobucket, Flickr and Webshots are other options that you can take advantage of when trying to sell your photos. Sites such as these allow you to label your pictures with descriptive “tags”, which will other users locate your images when searching for specific topics. As with the social networking sites, simply list your contact info. and prices in your profile.

Regardless of which method(s) you select, it is imperative that you put some kind of watermark or identifying text on your images. This prevents people from “stealing” your images and also is a great way to advertise your website or blog for free! I use a watermark on all of my online images (Flickr, Myspace, Facebook), either linking to my tech site, OCIA.net (before I started this blog) or directly to my blog.

Have any of you ever sold pictures online? I’d love to hear about what worked best for you…

I’m no different than the next entrepreneur - always thinking of new and innovative ways to make money. I tend to do most of my “thinking” in the shower, and tonight was no different. But for whatever reason, I got to thinking back to some of my earlier entrepreneurial schemes, which I thought might be interesting to share with everyone.

The earliest endeavor that I can remember was in 5th grade. One of the many fads back then were these keychains made from craft beads. Everyone seemed to love them, so I decided to make a few and try to sell them at school. As Borat would say, “great success!.” I took the few bucks that I made that day and bought more supplies. Within a week, I was coming home with $20-40 per day; quite the haul for a 5th grader with a $10 per week allowance!

My next experiment was in 8th grade and involved selling gum. I would purchase a pack of ten 5-packs of gum for $1.25, then sell each pack for a quarter, netting me $2.50 for my $1.25 investment. Of course, the teachers didn’t really like me doing this… I guess because it interrupted class and may have broken some kind of rule.

The problem that I found with both of these ventures is that I didn’t diversity, and thus, the “business” ultimately went under. Had I offered other bead products (bracelets, anklets, necklaces) or different kinds of candy, I most certainly would have made more money.

Once I hit high school, I started experimenting with my first tech site, and ever since, I have focused my efforts at online ventures. This time, however, I am keeping my past experiences in mind and am experimenting with new methods, new projects… not just sticking with what works at first and running that into the ground.

I know many of you are also into several different “money-making” projects. What was your first endeavor and ultimately, how successful was it?

Almost exactly one year ago, I posted my 2007 CES in Retrospect article. So, how did things pan out this year, and did I stick to my goals from last year?

To sum things up, comparing this year to last year was like night and day. As much as I hate flying, it was SOO much easier and faster to just fly there and get it over in about three hours… instead of 30 (yes, we drove last year). I decided that we would stay on the Vegas Strip this year at Treasure Island. Last year, we stayed with one of Keith’s friends who lives just outside of Vegas. This had its benefits - free shelter - but at a cost… that cost being time and convenience. Staying on the Strip saved us a ton of time and allowed us the freedom to attend more events than last year and meet up with some friends for dinner, to hang out, etc.

As far as productivity this year, things were much better as well. Last year, we posted a total of 10 CES coverage articles. This year, we wrapped things up with a total of 17 articles, which are listed below.

CES: Unveiled
Bill Gates Keynote
Booth Babes
Tagan, Data Drive Thru
OCZ Technology
AEE Show Floor
Arctic Cooling
Art Lebedev
Logitech
Yoggie Security Systems
The Parties
Thermaltake
Cooler Master, CSX, Zalman
Razer
Jook
The Cars
Tycrid

Splitting into teams worked pretty well this year, but I still have some planning to do for next year to fine-tune time management. I booked too many meetings and didn’t set aside enough “downtime” to write articles, which resulted in some pretty late (or early) nights and lack of sleep.

So what changes will I make next year? Well, that all depends on who/how many people from the site go next year. Early guesses would tell me four once again, which would be desired. Next year, I will aim to get two hotel rooms. Four people in one room… while it did work, was a bit cramped and can suck when some people are tired while others are working on articles.

Another change I have in mind, that I didn’t even consider this year, is switching up the job of taking pictures and taking notes. I discovered that if one person took all the photos and the other did all of the note-taking, only the note-taker was able to write an article because the photographer was busy taking pictures and didn’t know anything about the products. This isn’t really fair, making one person do all the writing when it comes time to do an article, so next year, I will look to rotate this job.

Finally, I am thinking about having a “day” and “evening” team. The day crew would get up and out on the show floor early, do some meetings, floor coverage, then have the rest of the day to relax a bit and get some articles done on the day’s coverage and be able to get in bed at a reasonable time. The evening crew would get things started later in the day and be responsible for hitting up the evening press events and parties at night. Parties are a great place to network and meet new people. This crew would of course be out real late, so they would get to sleep in the next day, then wake up, do some article writing and start all over again later that evening.

These are just some things I have to think about over the coming year, but either way, CES was a big success and I can’t wait until next year’s show! Big thanks to Josh, Keith and Airica for attending this year - your help was greatly appreciated!

Today is the 1 year anniversary for this blog. I totally forgot that this date was coming up, and I had just started on writing a different post when it hit me!

In the past year, I have made a total of 626 posts which have received 1,399 comments. On Technorati, I have a Rank of 32,949, Authority of 180 and 149 fans (people who list me as a favorite).

Reflecting on the past year, this blog has really been a lot more fun than I anticipated. This is a great outlet to share my thoughts and opinions on various topics (Why Alexa Rankings Are Garbage and Why Being Single Is Great), take a trip down memory lane (Being an 80s Kid and Tool-Assisted Console Game Movies) as well as giving my friends a place to come and see photos from all of our random activities (Memphis in May BBQ Fest and Buffalo Wild Wings).

I have also had the opportunity to meet some really great people through blogging that I would not have known otherwise. I look forward to another great year for this blog. Thanks to everyone for their support and comments, which is what has made this blog what it is today. And a huge thanks goes out to my friend Bob Buskirk for giving me the idea and motivation to start this project a year ago.

Keith, Airica and I attended The Tech Zone Media CES Kickoff Party held at the Absolute Suite in Caesars Palace on Sunday night. The party is hosted by John Chow every year and is a great way to kick off the week.

This party was co-hosted by Bob Buskirk from ThinkComputers.org and Stephen Fung from FutureLooks.com.

We arrived a few hours after the party but there were still a good bit of people when we came in.

There were plenty of drinks to go around, thanks to the open bar… and from the looks of it, everyone made good use of it! Below are a few more random pictures from the party. Enjoy!

Bob, Ashley and I.

John and I.

Justin and I

Stephen and I.

From left to right, Justin, Bob, John, Me, Ramsom from Thermaltake.com and Mikie.

The 2008 CES officially kicked off today as the show floors were opened to industry affiliates and media earlier this morning. Normally we would wait until the end of the week to publish our CES “Booth Babes”, but let’s face it, everyone loves booth babes, so if we don’t have to wait, why should you?

Be sure to check out our photo gallery and Digg It!

Besides the Booth Babe pictures, we stopped by the OCZ Technology suite for a tour of their new products. Afterwards, we attended the Tiger Direct Build Your Own PC Race For Charity event. We then split into two teams; Keith and I went to the OCZ party at the Bellagio hotel while Josh and Airica went to Showstoppers and the Corsair party at the Wynn Hotel. Look for articles on Showstoppers and OCZ sometime tomorrow.

The Consumer Electronics Show isn’t the only trade convention going on in Las Vegas next week. Thats right, the Adult Entertainment Expo will co-exist in Vegas from January 9-12. The first two days are like CES - trade and press only, but the final two days are open to the public.

The show opens at 2:00 pm Thursday to the public, with one-day fan tickets selling for $73.00 online or $80.00 at the door. Tickets are limited so they suggest you order online to ensure you get one.

Thursday is the last day of CES and we will have already conducted all of our meetings and show coverage, so Keith and I are planning to check it out. Cameras are allowed on the show floor which is a definite plus! I just have to decide if I will post the photos on OCIA.net as part of our CES Coverage (Safe For Work, of course) or just post them on my Flickr Page.