The Road We Take
January 5th, 2009 by KenricAs we travel to 2009 I took some time to figure how I got to where I am today. It’s natural to think about what if’s and how things could have been done better. But what most of us don’t realize is that things we have or don’t have, know or don’t know are very dependent on each decision we make. We never know where one decision leads us so we can’t really wish we hadn’t made one decision or another because in reality everyday there are many choices you make that determine the day after.
My big decision was in 2004 when I decided to leave my job and move out west. Often times I compare where I am today to the what if I stayed question. I think the reason I do this is that I always think that I can add up what I have today and just add my old job back into the mix.
Back in 2004 I left a six-figure job paying let’s say around $100,000. Assuming I would have gotten a 3% raise per year, my salary would be about $112,000. Let’s add to that my ebizes that bring in an estimated $20,000 and my real state that I have in SLC, AZ and Chicago. That’s not bad at all, a high paying job, side businesses that can be run at night and real estate that is doing relatively decent.
But this would have never happened. If I stayed at my job the chances are that I would have a $112,000 paying job and 2 pieces of property in Chicago. I would know nothing about online businesses. This blog would not be here. I would know nothing about real estate in any other state.
I look back at my ebiz path and it really is an interesting story.
In 2004, I had just moved to Arizona. I had just evicted my crack head, hooker, Section 8 tenant and moved into the trashed condo with no furniture. I did not want to furnish the condo until I my new carpet was installed. I spent 3 weeks sleeping on a sleeping bag and all I had was my computer on the floor. I had nothing else to do but surf the web. This is when I decided to start my blog. I don’t remember why I decided to make one. I do remember it was called monarchcrest.blogspot because I just got done riding that trail in Colorado. Before this day I only had a personal website.
March 2005, I meet Robert Kiyosaki at Rich Dad HQ along with a bunch of other people who post on the Richdad forums. Along with real estate investors I met a few people who made their money online which was totally foreign to me. Their presentations intrigued me enough to begin studying and learning about online businesses.
November 2005, I sign up for an affiliate account at Amazon and try to sell Kiyosaki and Trump’s new book. My plan was to get the 6% or whatever for selling each book. Then I decided to sign up for Google Adsense and put it on the site. The adsense was making alot more money than selling books. I added Adsense onto my blog shortly after.
Got my own domain name for my blog and started to understand web hosting and a little php. Began reading the how to make money online blogs. I started to dabble with adsense and affiliate sites and began to learn about SEO and PPC. I remember my first conversation with a guy about getting traffic and he was talking about inbound links, page rank, anchor text and it was all going over my head.
Spring 2006 at the Richdad gathering a few internet guys were taking about 100% returns while I was trying to convince them to put down $30,000 and get $200/mo cashflow.
Spring 2007, read the 4 Hour Work Week and although I had already knew what he was preaching, it definitely pushed me more towards online business.
Summer 2007, tried to purchase an established online business but people were either asking too much or just wishy washy about selling. Frustrated after not finding any, I decided to try to start my own. I didn’t know anything about shopping carts, payment processors or dropshipping but I wasn’t scared to learn as I go. Opened online store and the rest is history…
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