So Emil, How did you get into Domaining?

My profession in IT consulting. I’m a Consultant back home doing network and security for International consulting firm in Makati. When I started travelling abroad, I had noticed extreme increased in online activities, started buying domain names, and more outside of dot com. Though I highly recommend to other EntrePinoyship (don’t check the domain name, it’s taken) to start in dot com investment. When they understand the business, then start to branch out with other extensions e.g. .net .org .info .biz .us .etc and, diversify in web consulting, designs, buy and sell.

How’s your experiences in Domaining?

I started domaining as a hobby, it’s fun and slowly transition to a full-time business. Of course in every business there’s up and down, you just need to know when to minimize your losses.

How well have you made money off Domains?

It’s not polite to discuss in details. Let’s put it this way. I have an excellent yearly bonus. My domain names are self-sufficient and will use them for my early retirement. I hope this help. Let me know if you have other questions.

What advise would you give for a newbie domainer?

I recommend to start in dot com domain names, and find your niche. For example, real estate or travel related domain names. Simply because you can get advertisers from local travel agency, good PPC rate, and lots of affiliate programs in this industry.

Do you buy or sell domains? Or Buy and Develop Domains?

I mostly buy and develop to a simple cms website to establish traffic. I sell some domains to generate funds for a new project or for a family vacation.

Which Domain Extensions would you recommend?

For newbie, start with dot com but if you have a local target .PH should be ok. Over crowded na kasi ang dot com (Dot Com’s over crowded).

—- End of Interview —-

Thank you so much Emil for the Interview opportunity, I hope that it could help people start their way into Domaining. Check out Emil’s website at King.net

Other Articles you might also like:

1. Interview with Andre Tanner, Great Local Filipino Domainer
2. Interview with Bruce Marler, Expert Domainer and Developer
3. Filipino Affiliate Marketing Expert – Interview with Ian Fernando

One of the most famous Filipinos in the Affiliate Marketing industry, Ian Fernando is one of Affiliate Marketing’s Expert. What’s really great about him is that despite the success he’s achieved he’s still very approachable and down to earth. He’s also offering affiliate marketing mentorship program, and he’ll pass on his expertise on whatever you need for affiliate marketing success. He’s allowed me to do an interview with him despite being busy with Affiliate Summit, here’s the interview…

What is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate Marketing is promoting a product or offer and receiving a percentage or fixed payout base on the merchant or advertiser.

How did you started in the field of Affiliate marketing?

I actually started by stumbling on affiliate marketing. In the past I owned an ecommerce website and earning money via ebay. It was a lot of work dealing with the customers and tracking the product via snail mail. I needed something that was easier and less work. Affiliate marketing cut out all the support and the responsibility of having a product.

Why Affiliate Marketing?

As stated above, it cuts out the need of dealing with customer support or with the actual product. This in turns helps you concentrate on the actual promotion and marketing without the need to worry if the customer will receive their product. In essence it cuts out customer support.

Why Not Pay Per Click (PPC)?

PPC is just a method to promote the advertiser or merchant. PPC is just another source of traffic which we can utilize to drive traffic to the desired offer or item. It is far easier to use PPC than SEO because of the fact SEO takes too long to rank while PPC is instant traffic which you can analyze right away.

How do we start in Affiliate Marketing?

To start in affiliate marketing, I suggests chosing the right network. I suggests visiting AFFPinions.com and find the right network which you would like to work. By finding the right network they will help you better advance yourself. The network was the first who was some what like my mentor and they has helped me achieve my goals that is necessary to enjoy what I do.

Top 3 Lessons that you wish to share

• First lesson is to DO IT and stop reading blog and forums. You need to actually do something to learn from it. I personally failed several times and found it beneficial to me. By jumping into it and learning from my mistakes made it easier for me to understand what affiliate marketing was about.
• Another is to utilize the network and get them to help you. They are there to help you because if you do not make money then the network does not make money. So it is their responsibility to help you and guide you the right way.
• Keywords are important. It is important to think outside the box and think what may not be relevant to the main keyword. Even if the keyword is less than 2% related to the main keyword or offer, it may be that keyword that is making you the money!

What are the Highlights of your career in Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate marketing has push my brand out there and have given me the opportunity to speak about affiliate marketing. It has also giving me the insights to market online. Their are multiple ways to market but it has giving me the understanding on how to look at traffic and how to properly analyze the traffic base on the traffic trends that I receive.

How do you see affiliate marketing in the next 5 years?

There are multiple things that is currently happening in affiliate marketing but I see it here to stay. I know more people are going to be more creative on how they promote and certain growth of offers will be more geared to buyers instead of actions. This will create more of a buyer experience base on the recessions, but also may deplete because we are currently climbing out of the recessions. Affiliate marketing is interesting because it is constantly changing, the way users promote and get the users attention is interesting. Especially how users get users to click the submit button.

—————————–

Thank you again so much Ian for allowing me to do the interview with you, if you’d like to follow Ian through his blog, you could visit him at http://IanFernando.com.

Other Articles you might also like:

1. Why PPC is the first step to Affiliate Marketing
2. My Favorite WordPress Affiliate Marketing Plugin MaxBlogPress’ Affiliate Ninja
3. Affiliate Marketing Networks I Joined in

During the tough times that Philippines has experienced with the typhoon calamities, I asked for support from domainers to post on how to donate to the red cross. One of the people that responded really quickly was Bruce Marler from BruceMarler.COM. A domainer and developer, at the same time, he’s one of the people that I look upto in the world of domaining. As a thank you to Bruce, I’ve asked an interview so that I could feature him in TechFilipino, here’s how it went…

How did you start Domaining?

I had started my technology career at ATT back in 1996 when they were first deploying their Internet backbone, based on this I became familiar with the concept of domain names early in my tech career. I bought my first domain in 1997 but did not start focusing a lot of time and effort into it until 2002. Around that time I was working for Lucent Technologies and with the downturn in the telecommunications industry I had to hedge my bets and started coming up with names for a business of my own, based on this I started checking on various available domains. It did not take long to realize the power of having the proper domain name for your business and that it really was no different than quality real estate.

How much time and money have you invested into Domaining?

Over the past several years I have been doing domain investing part time only while I focused on my sales position at a technology company. This past year I have quit my corporate job though and started focusing on domain investing and domain business development as my primary career. Anyone that thinks domain investing is easy work would be wrong, there are a lot of hours each day spent researching and negotiating domain acquisitions and sales but its something I love to do which makes it not seem not work.

What are the Highlights of your domaining career?

Without a doubt it was leaving my corporate position this year to focus on developing Missouri.me into a statewide media portal for the state that I reside in. Domain investing allowed me to acquire the name and build a business focused on web development and online marketing for small businesses in rural communities.

Top 3 Lessons that you’ve learned that you’d like to share to other Domainers

1) Research, Research, Research – Do not start buying and selling until you have spent many hours researching and understanding the industry. There are many people that are happy to mislead you and make money off of that. Take your time

2) .COM is King but creativity rules – At the end of the day .COM is the most popular domain extension, but if you are creative with your marketing and focus on building a business you will learn that having a great name is very important, but you can buy alternate extensions and do well also. For domain investing though .COM will always rule.

3) There are still good names available – It is still possible to find quality names at reasonable prices or hand registered. They may not be the million dollar names but there are solid product and service related names available, especially now that many domain investors have let quality names drop based on the downturn in the economy.

Top 3 tips for new or starting domainers

1) Do not buy names just because they sound cool.

2) Back to Top 3 Lessons Learned – Research, take the time to get involved on the domain forums, reading the blogs on Domaining.com, learn the industry and what makes a quality domain before you jump right in.

3) Focus on QUALITY over QUANTITY – One great name is better than 1000 bad names.

How do you see Domaining in 5 years time?

I think you will find domainers starting to focus more on quality names than just having large amounts of names mainly due to the drop in PPC revenues and the fact without the PPC revenue the renewal fees may be hard to swallow. You will also find domain investors finding news ways to creatively generate partnerships and revenue from their top properties. The parking companies will need to evolve as well, once again with PPC revenue dropping new revenue options by the parking companies will become very important.

Thank you so much Bruce for the support that you’ve given to Filipinos and for the time given for this interview, I look forward in reading more of your insights and experiences in domaining. Please go and visit Bruce Marler.

Other Articles you might also like:

1. Phone Call with Morgan Linton, expert domainer and web developer
2. Love your domain names, conflicts of a domainer developer
3. Interview with a Fellow Filipino Domainer – King.net

I’ve had a great chance to interview the founder of Farawayfish, Mr. Nick Annetts.Fawawayfish, I believe, is one of the best amongst leaving a message to your loved ones when you pass away. The way the system works is really amazing, you’ll see how they’ve thought of a lot of angles and how much hard work was put into it. I’ve covered their website before here. Here’s how the interview went:

The man behind FarAwayFish : Nick Annetts

A web entrepreneur with a strong passion in making FarAwayFish a household name. He studied in Middlesex University, London and took the course BA Business Studies.

So Nick, What made you both pursue a Tech career?

I started with data analysis, it was a booming industry, with some interesting applications. The more techy stuff I did early on, has stood me in good stead for developing tech based business strategies

Are you working with a team? What is it like working together as a team?

Yes, I have a team of about 8. The challenge if the project is yours, is to trust your team members and their expertise in a given area. Sometimes they simply know better than you, and you have to trust in that.

Any challenges in doing so?

If they are working with you, particularly if it’s payment by shares (as is a necessity on a startup), you have to make sure they are as enthusiastic as you. Nobody should be there for the ride.

What other Web ‘businesses’ are you currently involved in? Are they still functional? How are they doing?

One at a time, this only major one at the moment, although I have some plans for 2 more sites, maybe next year.

Who came up with the idea of Farawayfish?

I came up with the idea about 2 ½ years ago, but if you mean the name, that came a bit later. We all liked it, it has a kind of meaningful abstractness about it, if that makes any sense!

How did (you) come up with the idea for the website?

In Bangkok, we were going to a new year gathering, when we heard a bomb had gone off, killing some people. I suddenly thought, if I had been one of them, how would all my friends around the world and online friends know?..They’d be emailing me thinking I was just too lazy to reply. The idea then grew from there.

How long did it take you to do so?

It took about 3 months to research and formulate the plan for the core functionality. I wanted to send triggered emails if I died, and also leave my own legacy, or profile online for others to take comfort in, or hopefully enjoy.

There’s some similarity with P.S. I Love you movie, have you seen it?

Ha yes, I saw it and quite enjoyed it. I had hoped to launch around the time it came out., but it took us nearly one more year to get things right. Lots of people draw a comparison, and the plot certainly could have worked with farawayfish.

Who’s your target audience?

Well I started off thinking niche, people who are terminally ill, or people in dangerous jobs. But I hope we attract anyone who thinks they have something worth passing on. But realistically it will probably be 35+ or younger if you have kids. There’s so much you could leave in a profile that young children could learn from when they are older (Dads tips on love, university etc). You could even use the blog section as a diary, knowing if something happened, the world would have an insight into your life.

How big is the “Last email after you die” industry?

Well if you’re online, you will send a last email at some point, so better plan it! It’s difficult to quantify, but there are a few sites out there, offering a last email service, but none with the depth of ours or the online profile publishing functionality.

How many members do you currently have?

We’ve been up and running just over a month and have had over 5000 unique visits and hundreds of sign ups, with little or no advertising, so I’m pleased with the take up. We are still tweaking the messaging, then, when I am happy, we’ll really start promoting hard.

I’ve noticed that you use “informers” to confirm of someone’s death, wouldn’t they feel weird if you do that?

I hope not, we do recommend that users also speak to their informers. But I suppose in a way it should be seen as an honour ,you are literally trusting somebody with your life and final wishes.

Wouldn’t that raise suspicion that something might be wrong with you?

We all go, and you don’t have to be very sick to do so. I suppose its emotional insurance. You know, YOU are in charge of your own legacy.

How much investment have you invested in Website (From Scratch)? (Time and monetary value)

Ohh ouch. Probably about $20 000 purely to get set up, but hundreds, probably into the 1000s of people hours from the team and myself (That’s not including all the waking up in the middle of the night, and shower thinking time!) With the extra functionality planned for phase2 the $ cost will rise, but I’m hoping that will be funded

Who are your competitors?

None have all our services such as the auto triggering or online profile, but there’s a couple of sites, mylastemail.com and deathswitch.com. I find them very limited and also very morbid

How does Farawayfish differ / compare to its competitors?

We have by far the best functionality allowing users complete online control of their own legacy. Our triggering system is unique, incorporating multi layer email and sms checking. None of the others allow you to build your own profile for publishing. But I suppose the most obvious difference is the branding and the tone. We are not morbid or funeral, but are about recording the great things you’ve experienced in your life to pass on.

What’s the Rough estimate of your earnings from Website?

That depends, on many things, but the site will be self funding in year 1 for sure. If we get the right contacts and promotion, for example, I’d like us to be used by military personnel as a “just incase” option. That would really see the site take off.

Are you currently working Full time for Website?

Well, 8hours a day! put it that way

Where do you see Website in the next 3 years?

I’ll look for some financial backing, this or early next year. This would allow me to maintain a back end presence in Asia, with satellite marketing offices working out of Europe and the US. I’d like the site be seen as the “norm”, “hey I’m on facebook and I also maintain a farawayfish presence, ‘cos you never know when!”

How do you see web startup’s perform during this time of recession?

It’s never ideal, but we have a free product, so I don’t think our sign ups will be affected. But I guess if you’re looking for financial backers to really kick start an idea, then these times are tough. Having said that, who wants to put all there money in a bank at the moment. If it’s a good idea it will swim (excuse the pun) whatever the conditions

How much funding does a web startup need to build a website?

That really depends. If you go out there asking for too little, people won’t take you seriously. But you can build a beta site to prove a concept for well under $10 000. Just make sure you get the core functionality in there.

What are the three important Lessons that you’ve learned when starting up websites?

1. Set your core idea out and then build it – DON’t let it grow and grow as you build – that’s a real temptation – you can always do that in phase 2.

2. Keep at it, because you WILL NOT get it right 1st time.

3. Don’t re-invent the wheel. Have a look at elements on other sites, tweak and improve on them. And of course see what’s free out there, and use it if you can.

Give 5 advices / suggestions / recommendations to other tech entrepreneurs out there who are wanting to start something online?

1. See what’s out there, if somebody else is already doing it, don’t necessarily let that put you off. It’s a big web with lots of users.

2. Get good hosting sorted out early, identify your needs – this will save you a lot of heartache. Don’t go solely on price.

3. Look for some interested partners to work with who have different skills to you, that maybe programming or marketing.

4. If you have a real killer idea don’t go telling everyone, and don’t be afraid to make people sign an NDA (non disclosure agreement) before you tell them. If they are serious they’ll respect you for it

5. Know your target audience, not everyone will love your site, but some people should!

— End of Interview —

FarAwayFish got me really inspired to think of really unique ideas that not a lot of people see in their everyday lives, it also got me really interested to how the whole system worked. The system, which I truly admire, was really well-thought of and you can see all the time and money placed into it. I also believe in their monetization strategy of having a freemium business model, as just giving all for free might not be the best way to go. I think sooner or later we’ll all want something to live behind and if we want to be “e-mortal” online, then this would be the best place to live our legacy.

Thank you very much Nick Annetts for taking the time to do the (long) interview and I hope FarAwayFish Team all the success.

Other Articles you might also like:

1. Interview with the Founder of BraveDaisy.com: Dmitri Bandiluke
2. Interview with the Founder of WorkOutBox: Simon Turner
3. Interview with the founder of SwapaSkill: Nicole Wehden

… is that it’s a win-win-win situation for the three main user category, which are Publishers, Writers and Advertisers. For publishers, they have a choice of publishing their own contents or taking other writer’s contents (which is part of their service) and mixing and matching contents to create a magazine. It also gives publishers a blog (on their website), so it contains all the content with the design handled by their website. The best part of it all is that you don’t need to find advertisers, as it is provided to you online, so your magazine is filled with advertisements and that you could justify your effectivity before charging (Great marketing strategy).

For Writers, it allows your to expand your reach and get widespread appreciation for your work. And there might be a way for them to charge for their work later on when advertisements are going to be charged, so you earn by providing contents to local magazines. For bloggers, all you need to do is submit your RSS feeds to the website and they’ll create an online magazine in an instant.

For Advertisers, it’s great to test the water out before fully paying for the advertisements. And getting into the local market, the advertisements are bound to be more effective.

The best thing about this magazine is that it’s local which I truly believe will win online wars for advertisements. Being an online / offline magazine also makes you a very effective media, it could also add effectivity by being a free magazine that people could pick up or download a copy. However, the question of the publisher being able to distribute the magazine successfully is probably the only hurdle that a member of the website will have to overcome.

Overall, I believe it’s a great idea to have a crowdsourced magazine that is a triple win situation. I’m a big believer of going local (just like how I came up with my website ideas), and I can see a big potential where this website is going. I can’t wait to see where this will go.

Other Articles you might also like:

1. Website Idea: One stop shop for your local business resource needs
2. Website Idea: Recommended Local Places, Taxi Drivers know best
3. Website Idea: What’s your local Fashion?

So Nicole, Who came up with the idea of Swapaskill?

I did.

I spent a good year or so trying to come up with the right idea. I had very specific criteria which I would highly recommend to anyone wanting to start an internet business. They were;

1. The idea will make a positive difference in some way
2. The idea has PR potential – a story that the media will be interested in. This gets you free PR and gives a great start to the business whilst building the brand.
3. The business can be financially sustainable in its own right without having to rely on advertising. The jury is still out on whether or not advertising as the only form of revenue is a sustainable model and I think it’s wise not to rely on it.
4. It was a cause I personally believed in and that I could get personal fulfillment and enjoyment out of.

For the first year or so every idea I came up with met some of these criteria but not all. Swapaskill met everyone and more!

How much investment have you invested in Website (From Scratch)? (Time and monetary value)

This is an interesting one. I have personally spent very little money. Why? Because I swapped skills with a web developer. That developer and his colleagues now own shares in Swapaskill and we have a fantastic partnership with skills that complement each other. There are many web developers registered on Swapaskill so lots of opportunity for budding internet entrepreneurs. People can join up for free and find web developers and designers from around the world who may well be interested in collaborating. It’s a fantastic way to build an internet business. I would recommend you give the developer shares in the business. If they have a vested interest they will make it a priority. If you have a great idea you can keep down your costs down by collaborating instead of buying the web design and development skills, plus getting some great PR stories to market the site. Also, nowadays there are some great viral ways of marketing your business which are relatively cheap. Like plugging into Facebook so members can invite their Facebook friends automatically in just two clicks. If your members believe in you, they will recommend you.

How would you monetize Swapaskill?

I can talk generally on this. The obvious one is always advertising but as I mention below I don’t think any business should rely on this. The best way of generating revenue totally depends on your business but I think in principle the important thing is to make it free to join and then show the real benefits of paying. Smaller charges for services seem to work best. I like the dating site model where you can search and find someone you like and then have to pay to small fee to make contact them and other members. It is made very clear what you’re getting for your money and at that point you know you want it! At Swapaskill we want to keep everything free for members if we possibly can.

Are you currently working Full time for Website?

Some days/weeks I work full time on it others part time. In time I expect to be working full time on it. Be prepared to work all hours all days! People expect the help they need even if it’s in the middle of your weekend!

Any success story from Swapaskill?

Yes we have numerous lovely success stories. You can read about some of them here.

What features can we expect in the future? Where do you see Website in the next 3 years?

How much funding does a web start-up need to build a website?

It all depends on what the business is. A website that is simply used as a vehicle for selling goods can be created very cheaply nowadays. $500 perhaps, whereas a highly interactive website with complex searching and matching capabilities would obviously cost a lot more. Server costs again vary as some sites are highly interactive and may have many thousands of people using the site at the same time like Facebook. It’s important to use the newer ‘elastic’ server services that now exist which means you only pay for the capacity you’re using at any one time. The old, more expensive way was to provide capacity that coped with your maximum usage which meant you paid for that capacity regardless of how much of it used. I go back to my original point though. Find people to swap with and you could get it all a whole lot cheaper, if not for nothing!

The biggest lesson I have learnt is KEEP IT SIMPLE AND USER FRIENDLY. Make registering a really quick and easy process. Check out Twitter and see how easy they make it or Facebook. In the early days we made it far too complicated. Think of a great name for your site as soon as the idea comes to you and register the URL and the Ltd company name straight away! Once the idea is out in the cosmos you need to protect it. We have numerous competitor but none of them have a name as good as our and it counts for something. If the name you have thought of is taken, think of another.

The importance of making sure you’re ahead of the game before you start. You can do this easily by going to Google adwords and checking the daily charges for coming to the top of google when people search the appropriate key words. So for example, when I keyed in ‘skill swapping’ or swap skills’ into google adwords it told me that it would cost around 0.01p per day to get to the top of google if people searched for those key words. That told me that no-one else was doing it in any big way yet. If you key in ‘dating’ to google adwords it tells you it will cost around £20,000 per day to get to the top of google when someone keys in dating! This tells you there is massive competition in this market.

What’s your advice / suggestions / recommendations to other tech entrepreneurs out there who are wanting to start something online?

1. Think of an idea that you are passionate about. Visualise what the world will be like when it’s successful. Ask yourself, will it make the world a better place and how? If you have all the right answers to these questions you will be committed to it and you will get great pleasure and personal fulfilment out of it.
2. Make your site very user friendly and simple. Get friends to do lots of testing and give you honest feedback.
3. Collaborate with people who have the skills you don’t to keep costs down. So you might be a business person who collaborates with a technical person.
4. Build your business team with people who have complementary strengths and weaknesses. So for example, you may be very creative and always thinking of new ideas which is great. You also need someone in the team who can turn those ideas into reality and do the ‘slogging’, detailed work that a more creative person may not be so good at.
5. Understand your market and what their main drivers are. Make sure your site gives them what they want and need.
6. Have someone on your team who understands viral and viral loop marketing.
7. Put together a strong marketing plan that highlights the skills you will need and the steps you need to take to make it successful.

—- End of Interview —-

Having a similar website idea,  SwapaSkill really got me inspired. With successful stories of skill-swapping members, being able to help out others while running a business is definitely a great personal satisfaction. Nicole has done a wonderful job in doing what she preaches, by making the website the first success story of SwapaSkill (collaboration with developers to create the website). I think, sooner or later, people are going to start seeing this as an alternative to paying expensive classes. With the market on online tutors / directories increasing, it won’t be long before they get a big slice of the market. I admire what they’ve done, and I hope to see more success stories in the future. Thank you very much Nicole for the opportunity and I hope you all the best with SwapaSkill.

Other Articles you might also like:

1. Interview with the Founder of BustAName and HostSearchr: Ryan Stout
2. Interview with the Founder of BraveDaisy.com: Dmitri Bandiluke
3. Interview with the Founder of WorkOutBox: Simon Turner

I’ve had a great opportunity to be able to interview the founder of WorkOutBox, Simon Turner. I found that he has great passion for health and fitness and is really doing whatever it takes to get WorkOutBox on top of the health and fitness websites. I have reviewed this website before, here. So here’s how the interview went:

The man behind WorkOutBox : Simon Turner

A 26 year old self-employed Web entrepreneur and fitness enthusiast with a passion to succeed.  He studied Electronic and Computer Engineering from the University of Nottingham

So Simon, What made you both pursue a Tech career?

After being introduced to programming in my degree, I knew instantly that IT and computing was the career for me.  I spent a few years working for a UK based software house, before taking things into my hands and going solo.

Are you working with a team? if so, What is it like working together as a team? Challenges in doing so?

The core WorkoutBOX team consists of myself and  Paul Johnson.  Paul is a fully qualified fitness instructor and he’s been responsible for creating all the fitness related content on the site.    I’m a big fan of outsourcing and have utilized many different programming teams to create the WorkoutBox site. Everything is done virtually so using the right tools to increase productivity is a must.  I like Google Apps / Docs and we all use them a lot. I also highly recommend DropBox for online file sharing,  it simply couldn’t get any easier.

What other Web ‘businesses’ are you currently involved in? Are they still functional? How are they doing?

I’ve learnt the hard way that taking on too many projects at the same time is simply a bad idea.  Working at 50% on two projects will never give you the traction you can achieve through working full time on one. I have plenty of other ideas for successful online businesses but I’ve put them to sleep for this reason. Contrary to popular belief, I actually see multitasking as a bad thing…

Who came up with the idea of WorkoutBox?

WorkoutBOX was born through my enthusiasm for both the web and personal fitness.  In my mind the internet was just full of really ugly looking fitness sites, that were written by body builders who made things far too complex for the average guy looking to tone up and get in shape.  WorkoutBOX is all about keeping fitness simple and accessible to pretty much everyone.

How long did it take you to do so?

Development started over a year ago, it’s been a long road in which we have changed direction a few times.

How much investment have you invested in Website (From Scratch)? (Time and monetary value)

Time – that’s very difficult to comprehend since so many people have been involved.  As far as my personal time, I would say 8 solid months (9 – 6).    Investment – around $8k

Rough estimate of your earnings from Website (yearly)?

Currently were still in pre monetization phase so I can’t comment on this.  However, I have the aim of being a millionaire by the time I’m 30 and I really feel that I can achieve this with workoutbox.  The online health and fitness market is huge and I don’t see what changing as people will always need to stay in shape.

Are you currently working Full time for Website?

Yes

Who are your direct competitors?

Sites like, www.muscleandstrength.com ,  www.intense-workout.com, www.exercisegoals.com

How does WorkoutBox rank against competitors?

We think very well, it provides simple yet informative content that is accessible to all.

How would you monetize workoutbox? (Adsense? Affiliate marketing?)

We will soon be launching a WorkoutBOX Pro members area which contains the more advanced workouts on the site.  Access to WorkoutBOX Pro will be through a monthly subscription of $3.

How much traffic do you get each month?

Currently its increasing by about 75% each month.  As of March 1st were at 9.5k monthly unique visitors.

Where do you see Website in the next 3 years?

Leading the way in personal fitness online.  We have big plans for WorkoutBOX and this is really only the beginning.

How do you see web startup’s perform during this time of recession?

From my personal perspective, I don’t see the web being affected anywhere near as brick and mortar businesses.

How much funding does a web startup need to build a website?

If you have the technical skills in house and you utilise an open source content management system things can be done very cheaply. Don’t try and do everything all at once though, keep things simple to start with and build upon them over time.

What Lessons have you learned when starting up websites?

Personally I would recommend making all high level architectural decisions yourself, only outsource to others when there are no decisions left to make.  Also…. I can not emphasis enough how important SEO is, the majority of webmasters fail to understand it properly and their businesses will suffer massively.  I spent 2 solid months working on WorkoutBOX’s SEO strategy and now 85% of our vistors come from organic search results.

What’s your advice / suggestions / recommendations to other tech entrepreneurs out there who are wanting to start something online?

• Your number one asset is your motivation, do whatever you can to ensure you keep it.
• Anyone can have an idea for a website, but being a successful entrepreneur boils down to the execution of that idea.  Making the correct decisions at both the technical and business level are vital. The most difficult problem you will overcome is trying to work out what mistakes you might be making, when you don’t know what they are.   Always aim for the ideal solution, and spend a long time thinking about what the ideal solution really is.
• Spend serious time researching your competition, understand exactly what they’re doing before you even start designing your site.
• Quit your day job.  I left a high paid job in London, moved back to my parents and worked on WorkoutBOX full time.  Trying to focus on a serious web business around your day job means you cut corners and make bad decisions, this leads to more problems and possibly failure.

—-End of Interview—-

Having an website idea similar to their website, WorkOutBox immediately struck my attention. I always wanted to have a website like this for my own personal workouts, as I’ve always seen those really plain and basic workout routine websites. Simon and Paul have done a wonderful job creating a Health and Fitness website that really makes looking for exercise contents easy and fast (Loved the ajax elements). I think there’s a huge market for this and with the focus on SEO, there seems to be a big chance of success for WorkOutBox. Many thanks to Simon and Paul for a great website and content,  and thank you Simon for the interview. Hope you guys all the best with WorkOutBox!

Other Articles you might also like:

1. DailyBurn: Fitness With Challenges, Motivation and Workout programs; WorkoutBox Competitor
2. Interview with the Founder of BustAName and HostSearchr: Ryan Stout
3. Interview with the Founder of BraveDaisy.com: Dmitri Bandiluke

I had a chance to interview the Founder of Bravedaisy.com. Bravedaisy is a website that serves as a means for people to make a first move in dating, it suits people who don’t have the confidence to walk up and tell that person they care about on how they feel and also want to know how they feel for them. How it works is that you make a set of questions for that certain person to answer and the website sends an anonymous email for them to answer and from there decide how you’ll do your first move. I believe this is just the beginning of a large project. So here’s how the interview went:

The Founder is Dmitri Bandiluke, he studied Journalism at Slavonic University during 2004-2008 in a small European country Moldova, where he is originally from. During his teenage years, he took classes at a Web-Design school, where he learned the basics of web-design and flash animation. I always wanted to participate in the Internet business and it brought him to the creation of BraveDaisy.com – the Web2.0 project he’s currently working on.

So Dmitri, What made you pursues a Tech career?
I always liked innovative Internet ideas that appeared during my teenage years. My interest to web-technology became even stronger when more and more Web2.0 sites started to immerge. I thought it would be great to participate in it somehow. So, eventually, I decided to bring the concept of BraveDaisy.com to life.

Are you working with a team? If so, what is it like together as a team? Challenges in doing so?
BraveDaisy.com is a family operated web-service. So yes, I work with a team. The key to our healthy team work is listening to each other opinions and ideas during all stages of the project development – from brainstorming to designing the web-site’s graphic elements.

What other Web “businesses” are you currently involved in? Are they still functional? How are they doing?
Currently I’m working on BraveDaisy.com only. But there are more interesting concepts to develop.

Who came up with the idea of BraveDaisy.com?
I came up with the idea. Actually, it had to be a part of a bigger project I was developing back in June-July 2008. But then I decided to make it an independent web-service.

How did (you) come up with it?
I was looking for interesting ideas for a startup and noticed that there was no service for people who wanted to make the first move in a relationship. The empty niche seemed to me really good and I started working on it.

Have you tried making the first move with BraveDaisy.com to anyone?
Sure, that is how I got together with my wife! )  Nah, I am just kidding. To be honest with you, I did not have a chance yet. But I will gladly use it when there is a necessity.

How effective is BraveDaisy?
In theory, BraveDaisy.com should be very effective for anyone who cannot or does not want to make the first move in an old-fashioned face to face way. There could be many reasons for it such as a person is a little bit shy, he or she does not want to ruin a friendship in case of rejection etc etc etc. After all, you do not need common friends with your crush anymore to learn if you love object is seeing someone or would like to date someone at the moment. On my list – it is very handy. But if you are talking about statistics – I cannot show you them yet, because BraveDaisy.com is a really fresh start-up that has just stepped into Beta-testing stage.

Won’t it be filtered in the spam in our emails? Would users actually do something about it considering the amount of spam these days?
Basically BraveDaisy.com e-mails never get into junk. We tested several email providers and our notification letters were always getting in the main inbox. But if a person wants to be 100% sure – they can add noreply@bravedaisy.com to their webmail contact list, and their email account (hotmail, aol, yahoo, msn etc) will know it is not spam.

Is there a success story already?
Because the service is still very young we did not receive any success story letters from BraveDaisy.com users yet. But it does not mean there are not any either.

How long did it take you to develop the website?
It took us 6 months to develop the service as it is now. But it is not the end of the road and new features are on their way.

How much investment have you invested in Website?
Minimum money – maximum time. It has been a full-time job for me.

Rough estimate of your earnings from Website?
To the moment the service is almost non-profit.

Where do you see Website in the next 3 years?
I see it as the best and the handiest on-line service for those who want to initiate a relationship. I see it as a loyal servant for them, an assistant who cannot talk but who is always ready to help.

How do you see web startup’s perform during this time of recession?
I think no recession can stop a great startup. A good service gets constant customers which give you income that undoes crisis. I think entrepreneurs should stick to what they are doing and do it the best way they can. That is what is going to help them even during bad economy times.

How much funding does a web startup need to build a website?
For me it is a hard question to answer because it solely depends on a particular case. There are stories about great web-sites that had a success with minimum funding and other examples when even big money did not help.

What Lessons have you learned when starting up websites?
The most important lesson I have learnt so far, while working on my startup, is that you have to stay positive no matter what. There are ups and downs all the way but you have to love what you are doing and believe in it if you want your startup to survive in the long run.

What’s your advice / suggestions / recommendations to other tech entrepreneurs out there who are wanting to start something online?
First of all, I think any entrepreneur has to ask themselves “Would it make any difference if my startup appeared in the Internet?” If there is a similar web-site around ask yourself another question – “Can I do it any better?” And the third question tech entrepreneurs should ask themselves “Would I found such web-site handy if it was not mine?” The positive answers to these simple questions will hint whether a startup can stand out in the Net at all. I know it is just the tip of the iceberg but it will give one a better hype-free understanding of his or her web-business idea.

—-End of Interview—-

The Conservative and old fashioned dating could be a great niche market, and the service seems to be able to help those in need. However, I believe that BraveDaisy needs other functionalities to survive which Dmitri mentioned is part of a larger project. I’m curious to how this project will go. Thank you very much Dmitri for doing the interview And I hope you all the best with BraveDaisy.

Other Articles you might also like:

1. Interview with the Founder of WorkOutBox: Simon Turner
2. Interview with the founder of SwapaSkill: Nicole Wehden
3. Interview with the Founder of FarAwayFish: Nick Annetts

I’ve had a great opportunity to interview Pedro, founder of Meozon, great guy with great technical skills. What’s really interesting is that one man had done around 6 personal projects that is really different from what other websites have to offer. With recession hitting hard, would the answer to solo web start-ups the answer to success? Pedro is born in Portugal and studied Electrical Engineering in Finish University and started worked in the field for 3 years. Until…

So Pedro, What made you pursue a Tech career?

I started my own business but at a certain moment in his life decided to follow a different career. I have always been interested in web issues, tech fields, but as a hobby. Now ( and since 3 years ago ) I’m following some other values, the experience of freelancing, making something I like very much – web building. I pursue a lifestyle where I can appreciate my values and part of it is the “tech” part of being involved on developing or building as I call. Even that my background was not this area ( web issues, tech projects ) I have a passion for it.

Are you working with a team?

Solo working with outsource collaboration in some fields.

What other Web ‘businesses’ are you currently involved in?

My work is focused in 2 parts:  personal projects – meozon.com and site developing for Portuguese companies (finishing agreement with another small company to extend services to Spain.)

So what type of websites do you do for your own personal projects?

I will give an overall picture of my personal web projects: Ideas that I like, that I use, and that could bring some value to the community. For me it does not matter if it is for a niche market or a larger audience as long as I am happy with the result.

And How are they doing?

Doing well, but you can’t make too much assumptions for how they will do tomorrow. Things are changing everyday and very fast so need to be prepared to adapt.

How much funding does a web start-up need?

Difficult to answer. Startups cover a very large kind of projects from simple and clever small projects to large team projects. I never participate in a large project and my resources are very limited, as my experience may not be extensible to others.

How do you see web start-up’s perform during this time of recession?

Same as the other businesses, start-ups and every web projects will have to prove what they’re worth. It might be more difficult for some projects that need constant funding support until some results appear, as investors will be more careful. Anyway, a good and valid project will have people prepared to invest. I hope.

What Lessons have you learned with your experience with web startups?

You have to believe in the project. If you do not trust in your “product” it will be difficult to “sell” the idea. After the inspiration for the project count with work, problems, difficulties… and success . Expect the best but be prepared for failure.

What’s your advice / suggestions / recommendations to other tech entrepreneurs out there who are wanting to start something online?

I do not know if I am the right person to answer this, as my knowledge and background in this area is not so profound. Anyway what I do is learning, studying and reading from how top success entrepreneurs archive their goals. I measure and auto evaluate my possibilities and what I can archive. The rest I organize with external collaboration so all the parts of the project can be as much professional as possible.

. . .

Final notes:

I thank Francis Simisim for the opportunity of this talk, which my very best success to your web projects.

Also, some questions due to time constraint were not completed as launching stimator is taking large part of my time ( project is alpha/beta ) so engine is still being improved to more accurate results.

———– End of Interview ————-

Unfortunately, given the amount of questions I’ve asked him and his limited amount of time, Pedro wasn’t able to answer a lot of the questions but it is interesting to see where he will be in the future. His personal projects really are something that got my interests, with algorithm like stimator, the time spent on researching and the formula to come up with the value is just awesome. Well I wish you all the success with meozon and hope to hear from your success soon.

Other Articles you might also like:

1. Interview with the Founder of BustAName and HostSearchr: Ryan Stout
2. Interview with the Founder of WorkOutBox: Simon Turner
3. Interview with the Founder of BraveDaisy.com: Dmitri Bandiluke

So Ryan, What made you both pursue a Tech career?

I’ve been programming since I was a little kid.  Being able to build applications and useful tools is something I’ve always enjoyed and if you build the right things, it can be profitable.  So it made since as a career choice.

How do you see web startup’s perform during this time of recession?

The main thing I see is that if companies have high startup costs, or no business plan, then its going to be harder to keep things going.

How much funding does a web startup need to build a website?

I’ve had quite a few successful sites without ever taking funding. All you need is a good idea and the skills to make it happen.  For those without the skills, funding can be a good option to find the needed skills, but even now finding people with the right talent is a challenge.

What’s your advice / suggestions / recommendations to other tech entrepreneurs out there who are wanting to start something online?

Build things you would use.  If you’re building something that you wouldn’t use (because its a good market, or whatever the reason), be sure to bring someone on board who would use it.  Market research can only take you so far, ultimately someone who will use the product needs to be involved in the design process.

———– End of Interview ————-

Although Ryan wasn’t able to provide much information, as he’s busy with his new project, at least he gave the time to answer and impart knowledge with us. With his previous websites, I’ve noticed really amazingly done websites which were really a good sign that he must be doing something even better. His earnings seems to be thru affiliate marketing thru different domain / hosting providers, and with a powerful tool and being a one stop shop for all providers, affiliate marketing will be an easy sell.

Thanks Ryan for the time and I hope you all the best with your websites.

Other Articles you might also like:

1. Interview with the Founder of Stimator and MeoZon: Pedro from Portugal
2. Interview with the Founder of BraveDaisy.com: Dmitri Bandiluke
3. Interview with the Founder of WorkOutBox: Simon Turner