I strongly doubt that ‘internetless’ is a word but for the sake of this post lets just let that one slide. I’m in an internet cafe on Bohol Island, Philippines and the stool I’m sitting on is making my arse ache and I just want to escape so go easy on any made up words or other literary crimes.

I’ve been spending time in some very cool, remote jungle hostels and haven’t had an internet connection. This has made getting anything done pretty hard. I’ve been filling my time instead with a bit of article writing for my new site and have been attempting to improve my terrible photographic skills.

It’s kind of relaxing being away from the net and not being able to check stats every 14 seconds. It makes coming to the internet cafe an event because I always have lots to catch up on. I’m still not totally comfortable working in them, though. Not sure I ever will be. This one is small and airy and there are no online gamers in site which is nice. It’s just this damned stool… so uncomfortable!

January is looking like a great month and might be my best or close to it. I’ve finally passed the $300 a month mark with Adsense and it looks like I’ll even clear $400 easily. I don’t have any explanation for this at all though.

On the budgeting side of things… the news isn’t quite as good. I’ve been having a great time, flying all over the place, doing what I want, drinking lots of rum and not keeping track of any of my spending so things could be bad when I tally everything up. Despite my lack of a budget though I still don’t think I’m close to spending as much as I’ll earn this month and that’s the ultimate goal, really. Budgets are boring!

Once I get back to Manila I’ll be checking in with some reviews of places I’ve stayed, how they are to work in and some photos and stuff so, fear not! I haven’t dropped off the face of the earth. Not yet, anyways.

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For the first time since my arrival in The Philippines about 10 days ago I’ve got no wifi in my hotel. They have a computer in their reception area but it was mysteriously ‘closed’ with no real explanation. I guess that means it doesn’t work? I will never know.

So I’ve found myself in a Filipino internet cafe to book a flight for tomorrow and if I wanted to work I think it would be pretty much impossible. The lights are all off and I’m surrounded by teenage boys tapping away at their keyboards, each with an army of more kids watching them play various flashing, fit inducing games.

I could probably do with a good working session since on Boracay, the last place, I did more beach sitting and hangover recovery than work but in reality I can’t wait to get the hell out of this room!

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I met a guy in Manila who described himself as a web marketer and of course I had to find out more. I think his idea is an interesting one and something I hadn’t thought of or heard of anyone else doing.

His plan is to register lots of local domain names for various services. So for example, torontodentist.com, hamiltondentist.com, niagarafallsdentist.com etc. The options are limitless really because you could focus on any sort of small business and any location.

He was in The Philippines because he had just employed four locals to work making cold calls back to cities in the US. His plan was to get to the top of Google for whatever keywords the domain was focused on and then to call around to related businesses to see if they would be interested in renting the top spot from him for $200 a month.

He doesn’t actually know anything about SEO beyond that it exists and plans to pay people to optimise all of this sites to get them to the top. Because he’s focused locally, he doesn’t seem to think he’ll have any problems ranking in the top spot for all of his domains. He’s aiming to sell 500 this year and at $200 each a month he’ll be rolling in it if he can pull it off.

What do you think of this idea? I think it’s quite creative and I can see why a business would want to rent it because if they don’t, their competition might. I think he might have a harder time than he thinks getting the domains to the top, especially without any good content on the site, but he seems confident.

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My first hostel is a dream for wireless workers. Their wireless connection is reliable and didn’t go down at all while I was there. In fact, I don’t think it even disconnected once. The internet connection even oozed down into my room which was great for when I just wanted to send a quick email or something without having to cart my gear upstairs.

There are plenty of power points scattered all around the common area with tables nearby as well. This is something I never would have even thought of but it really important if you’re looking to get a lot of work done without having to stop and charge up or work in an awkward position just because it’s near a power point.

I wasn’t alone either, there were always at least four or five other people tapping away at their laptops which was great because it made me feel like less of a nerd. I met one guy who was an internet marketer and he told me his idea which is an interesting one which I’ll share in a later post. Then there were a couple freelance photographers and I didn’t get a chance to ask anyone else if they were working on the move.

Friendly’s Hostel was a great place to stay for anyone who needs an internet connection and beyond that, the guy who runs the place makes sure everyone has fun. They even do a wine and cheese night on Saturdays which quickly deteriorated into a boozefest.

I’d stay there again in a heartbeat so add it to the list of wireless worker friendly places.

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I’m sitting here at Friendly’s Hostel in Manila on the roof and taking full advantage of their free wifi connection while I wait what feels like an eternity for my room to be ready. I’m stupidly tired so I’m not sure how productive I’m being but it’s still nice to be able to fill up waiting time with something semi-productive.

I tried to work on the long flight from London to Hong Kong but was sabotagued by the girl in front of me wanting to have her chair as far back as possible. It was all up in my face! I was able to keep it open but the keyboard was pushed into my stomach and the typing stance I had to adopt looked pretty ridiculous and was definitely not ergonomically correct! But what can ya do.

So I’m here, I’m stinky, I’m tired and I’m hoping sleep and a shower is on the horizon. So far so good on the work front though and if this free wifi in hostels thing is common then I should be laughing.

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I’ve been spending a ridiculous amount of time trying to create a Wordpress theme for Wanderstruck.com that I happy with and I’m about ready to throw my laptop into the streets. Well, not my laptop, my parents’. Not sure how well that would go down.

I know I could pay someone to whip me up something that suits in no time but this is something I really want to learn how to do and toying with the theme’s CSS is frustrating my to death but if I don’t keep hammering away at it, I’ll never learn.

So what are the results of my three weeks at home in Canada? Not much besides a lot of hair pulled out and late nights. I’ve done a few important things but as far as this new site goes, it’s like a black hole that sucks my time into it without showing much progress.

I thought it might be interesting to give the site’s link and let anyone who is really bored and wants to see how confused I am to have a look at my progress (or at this point, total lack of any progress). Nobody ever shows their sites as a work in progress. It always seems to be an all or nothing deal which makes sense but it might be interesting to some people to see how much I still rely on trial and error and to also see how many design changes I’ll make before this puppy goes live.

I’m doing my theme editing work at http://www.wanderstruck.com/blog but you’ll probably spot changes to the main page soonish as well. I was initially hoping to have this site alive and kicking by the time I leave Canada on Monday but if that happens then it will be some kind of act of god. I’ll be kicking back on the beach for my first week in the Philippines so if I can find some wifi and avoid temptation then you should start seeing some progress.

Hopefully.

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Happy Year everyone! I started the year off with a crippling hangover, as usual. As usual I swore off drinking ever again and, as usual, I don’t expect that to last long. December was another step backwards by a bit but I’m still pleased overall with there I am. I earned $1605.10 in December and am happy to be staying above that $1500 a month mark. I would have cleared $2000 easily for the first time had I kept my mouth shut about a link sale but I’m happy to have learned that touch lesson and I’m not going to dwell too much on it.

Earnings breakdown:

• Google Adsense - $268.24 - This seems to be stuck around this level and I’m not expecting it to jump up much until I build a few more sites which probably won’t happen until around April when I get to China.
• Affiliate Sales - $674.44 - I had a great month in November for affiliate sales and while I wasn’t expecting to keep that pace up, I wasn’t expecting it to drop off quite as much, either.
• Linkworth & Text Link Ads - $106.99 - This has been pretty steady lately with a link dropped or added here and there without much predictability. I know I said I’d be keeping this site ad free but now that it’s gotten a bit busier I might try for some Text Link Ads. I’m curious to see if a site like this, about making money online, will sel links more quickly than my travel sites.
• Private Link Sales - $355 - I had about $500 worth of links up for renewal and managed $185 worth of renewals plus another $50 that a guy has yet to pay so an almost 50% renewal rate isn’t too bad, I guess. I also sold a yearly link for $170 which was my only new one.

I’ve been home for a couple weeks now and haven’t managed to work on my sites as much as I’d like (story of my life!) but I have got a few little annoying jobs done so it hasn’t been a total waste. Things are going to get interesting from here on in as I see whether working on the road is something I’ll be able to pull off and if my earnings will increase as a result.

I’ve booked my flight from Manila to Bangladesh for February 11th so I’d better get my arse into gear before I ship off to the land that the internet forgot! I think my goal for January will be to not lose or break my laptop! I don’t see myself getting much done until I settle in Beijing in April so I’ll keep my expectations low and hope for the best!

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