Before I started earning anything online I was pretty tight with my cash. Back in 2001 when I first started doing this as a hobby I was already shelling out about $20 a month in hosting fees and $35 a year for my domain. I figured that was enough for something that, at the time, held no promise of financial return.

But once I was able to cover my expenses and started earning more, my wallet suddenly loosened up a bit and I found myself putting most of my earnings back into my sites.

Website things I spend money on:

• Domain names - If I think of a good name and it’s available then I’ll be all over it! Back when they cost $35/year each with Network Solutions (I was getting ripped off by them up until a year ago) it wasn’t really possible. Now with them under a tenner it makes snapping them up a lot ess painful.
• Advertising - Ill keep this short because it’s a bit taboo but I will buy *ahem* links if I come across a great site with a good price. Not something I do a lot but if I see a good deal then I will. Havent in a while though. Honest.
• Articles - I’ve recently started buying London area guides for ten quid per area which I think is a total bargain. I could probably do some research and come up with guides myself but it would take ages and would never be as good as someone with first hand knowledge. This is something I’m going to do a lot more of in the future because I think first hand experiences make a site a lot more useful and interesting.
• Programming - I got a guy to do my London price guide for $20 initially then another $25 to re-jig it a bit. I think this was money well spent and I know enough about how it works to be able to adapt it to other sites. Having the idea is the hard part because it seems like these guys can make almost anything happen. Obviously, the more complicated the idea the more it will cost but it’s nice to know that there are people out there who will be able to put any big ideas into action.

Stuff I don’t spend money on but will at some point:

• Website design - My favourite part about building sites is, well, the building of the sites. I like sketching out the designs, tinkering with the colours and layout and experimenting until I find something I like. That’s ok with HTML sites but I’ve started thinking about using Content Management Systems (CMS) like Wordpress and Joomla to make managing my sites easier and that’s where things start to get a bit over my head. Paying someone to set something up for me will make sense if I ever want a site that’s a bit more complicated than I can handle myself.
• Nerd books - So far I haven’t had any time to learn new things but I’m thinking that will change once I find myself in Beijing without a ‘real’ job. I’d like to read up on CSS and PHP for sure at some point as well as general web design and SEO stuff.
• Logo design - This is another thing I really like doing myself but I can never seem to achieve the same professional finish that the experts can. I’m still a sucker for a site with a great overall look and I wouldn’t be against buying a logo to complete that look on my sites.

Most of my web earnings head straight into my Paypal account and all of my spending comes from it as well. It’s a lot easier to spend money that I never see and even easier to spend it knowing that it has been earned my sites in the first place.

So if you find yourself with a couple of sales and a bit of money in your Paypal account, have a think of ways you might be able to invest your earnings back into your site. Don’t blow it, but don’t be stingy either. If you make some smart buys it is sure to pay off later.

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I’m back in Canada and have been for a few days now. I’ve had lots of time to post and work on my sites, but have I? A big fat NO is the answer to that question.

Despite my love of wandering around without any plans or commitments, I really am a bit of a creature of habit. I’ve been working really hard over the past few months in London largely because I’ve had a quiet place to work and was in a routine. Here in Canada I don’t really have an office type space and I’ve found it hard to concentrate. It’s 10:15pm and my parents are asleep and this is the first real chance I’ve had to get some work done.

I’m working from the kitchen table at the moment which isn’t ideal. I might have to clear a space in the basement to hide myself away in for a few hours a day because this isn’t cutting it! Too much going on around me and the fridge is too close and seems to be raided often by me.

I’m going to have to address both of these issues once I start travelling so I might as well try to get used to it before I go. I doubt I’ll ever have anything that resembles a desk until I get an apartment in China and I think there will always be distractions around me no matter where I am. 

So just a heads up that I’m doing my best to get back into a routine. I think I underestimated how difficult that might be. I guess I just assumed that once I’m no longer working I’ll have loads of time to work on my sites. The reality is that I’m easily distracted and if I can’t learn to deal with working in less than ideal situations then I’ll be pretty screwed!

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Inspired by some really good travel magazine type sites, I’ve been eager to try my hand at something similar. So far, this blog is the only site of mine that has any sort of interactivity and I love that aspect of it and want to transfer it to a travel site.

I’m pretty new to Wordpress and other content management systems (Joomla, Drupal etc.) but I can see that they have the potential to make building what seems like a complicated site a lot easier. I’m going to have plenty of time on my hands so I might as well learn some stuff in between sipping cocktails and working on my tan (or burn in my Scottish skin’s case).

I finished up some major projects last week and was itching to get cracking on this new site but I couldn’t think of a domain name that wasn’t taken. I’m picky with domains and I always go for a dot com unless I’m targeting a specific country. This seriously limited my choices. I ended up decided that I was really keen on having the word wander or wandering in there somewhere since I think that’s what travel is all about… wandering around without any plans really set in stone.

I tried loads of short phrases with those words without much luck. I found a few available domains but they didn’t really capture my imagination or were too long or hard to spell or something. Just sitting at my desk now I starting thinking about how good I think my Travoholic.com domain would be for the site I have in mind. I’ve decided to leave it as is though because it’s already a nice little earner but it’s frustrating at the same time because I want the domain name. But then it came to me! Why not start a whole new site called Wanderholic.com?

I think I like it. It’s hard to say. It’s easier to spell than travoholic (word of mouth people always assume it’s travelholic), I think it’s brandable, it’s short-ish for a new domain name, and I think it sums up perfectly what the site will be about - addicted to wandering around the world.

What do you think? Big winner or big wiener?

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Inspired by some great travel sites I’ve decided that I’d like to put my efforts into creating a travel magazine type site of my own that I can be proud of. I’ve got lots of ideas and I think that, because I’ll be travelling, I will be able to offer a lot of first hand tips and tales from the road that will hopefully set the site apart.

This has created a bit of a dilemma for me though. I have what I think is a good domain name with Travoholic.com, the site is about 7 years old, Google is in love with it, it has some great inbound links and I really think it’s the best spot for the new site I have in mind.

The problem is that, at the moment, the site is a pretty good earner for me with Adsense, Text Link Ads, Linkworth and direct link sales even though it’s sort of crappy. I’m not sure the type of site I have in mind would be that well suited for affiliate programs so I’d be monetising it with those same four things.

I guess my dilemma is an ‘if in ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ type thing. True, the site how it is now isn’t the best looking thing in the world and has been neglected, but it also earns me a decent amount each month. If I were to scrap it completely and start with a new site I’m worried that I’d be throwing that money away. Most of my traffic currently comes from Google and I wonder if the new site would rank as well, or at all, for the same keywords.

My other option would be to start a whole new site from scratch and leave Travoholic.com alone to rot away slowly. Finding a domain name will be a nightmare but I’m sure with a bit of creativity I’ll be able to come up with something. I don’t doubt that the new site will do well with time because I have a lot of other sites that can link to it and the quality will be high, but I really feel that Travoholic.com is the right place for it, especially because it has a lot of great inbound links that I’d have a hard time getting again.

I guess I just don’t like the idea of Travoholic.com becoming a neglected, link whoring site. I like to build sites I’m proud of and even though it will probably continue to earn a decent amount of money and bring in plenty of daily visitors I’ll still always think I can turn it into something better.

I think I’m leaning towards registering a whole new domain and starting the new site from scratch. I suppose I can always go back to Travoholic.com and tidy it up when I have the time. It’s not a total lost cause, just a bit unruly.

What do you think I should do?

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Since I began the overhaul of my working holidays site I’ve been 100% convinced that I wanted a forum. I was so into the whole forum idea that I was even going to spring $160 for the grand daddy of them all, vBulletin, rather than a free option. I figured that if I was going to spend the time nurturing it I might as well have a platform with all the bells and whistles.

Now as I think about it more and more I’m wondering if a forum is really the way forward. I’ve set money aside to buy it so that’s not the issue. I’m more concerned about whether the time it takes to get a forum up and running will be worth the potential payoff.

Forums don’t tend to be big money earners from what I’ve heard. A good one will increase a site’s page views drastically but whether this traffic converts or not is up for debate. Plus there’s the effort involved in getting it off the ground, maintaining and policing it. In the early days, starting a forum usually involves the creation of multiple personalities and a lot of talking to yourself online. I’d also have to do a lot of question answering from those rare legitimate posters and, because of the nature of the website, this could mean a lot of time spent researching answers.

Once people start visiting the forum more regularly, so do the spammers and keeping on top of dodgy posts is a huge headache. I’m sure there are things that will reduce spam but I’m not sure if they’re 100% effective and I would think I’d still have to spend some time zapping the porno posts etc.

But on the other hand, forums are great for building a sense of community and could act as a place for any contacts I make through the blog to go for a chat amongst themselves. It would also allow people to ask questions that I’d never have thought of and give me new ideas for what I can add to my site. Plus it gives people a chance to solve each other’s problems and free content is always good!

So I guess I’m in a bit of a dilemma. I’m doubting my choice to add a forum because I’m not sure if an active forum will be worth the time it takes to get it up and running. What do you think? Do forums add overall value to a site in your opinion? Is the site’s topic one that you think would be served well with a forum?

Just to clarify, I’m think of adding a forum to Working Holiday Info, not Nerdy Nomad. There’s already a successful forum about travelling on web earnings over at Working Nomad.

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The thing that always annoyed me about blogs was the layout. Sure, new themes are popping up all the time but they all still look like blogs. Long content posts on the left and a crappy navigation system on the right. Same old layouts… boring boring boring!

Now that I’ve finally got a blog of my own I’ve gone and done the same thing with a boring design. Bad me. But I have I’ve been converted to Wordpress just a little bit because I like how easy it is to manage content. Once everything’s set up there’s no need to rummage around in the source code. Adding new content just takes a bit of writing and a few clicks and that’s fine with me.

Well now it looks like I can rejoice because some people are daring to be different and are getting a bit more creative with Wordpress. Take Brave New Traveller, Ubertramp and Vagabondish as examples. I’ve been reading all three of these blogs for a while. They were all sort of hovering between blog and online travel magazine - they looked like a blog but read like something more.

All of them are packed with great content and now they’ve added a great design into the mix which kicks everything up a notch. They’ve moved away from the traditional boring looking blog style to a one that looks more like a regular site with the ability to take advantage of all of Wordpress’ great features.

Seeing what these guys have done has gotten me excited about Wordpress again. Last night I found myself thinking about what I want to do with my seriously neglected backpacking site and seeing those sites in action has given me lots of ideas for a travel magazine type site of my own with a few twists that will hopefully set it apart.

Thanks for the inspiration guys!

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I’ve been spending a stupid amount of time on getting my new working holidays site up and running and I’m nearing the end. Problem is that I’m also nearing the end of my patience with it. I’m so sick of looking at it that I wouldn’t mind if the site spontaneously deleted itself into oblivion. Ok maybe that’s a bit hasty but you get the idea - I’m fed up.

I’ve done all the fun bits and now I need to tweak a few annoying things, write a lot of annoying articles, research some annoying information and install an annoying forum. The whole thing is, you guessed it, annoying the hell out of me at this point. I had all kinds of good ideas for the site but it seems to have sucked the life out of me and all I want to do at the moment is get it out of my face.

This is the first time I’ve felt this way since I started doing this website development thing. It probably has a lot to do with the fact that I’ve been working full time in my regular job, building sites for hours each night and have a lot of other things going on making life pretty busy. It probably won’t be the last time I feel a bit burnt out so I’ve come up with a little list of how I might deal with the problem.

• Launch the site, ready or not - When I find myself a bit sick of a project and start to neglect it, one thing that usually brings me back on board is landing a few Adsense clicks or affiliate sales. I expect this site to do well with Adsense so if I put it out there and start to see it earning well then that will be good motivation to keep working on it.
• Work on another site - I’m pretty scatty when it comes to building sites and I normally tend to jump between them doing little bits at a time. This is probably the first time I’ve sat down and worked on a single site from start to (near) finish without also working on my other sites from time to time. I’ve found myself thinking up ideas for my other sites but haven’t had the time to work on them so maybe mixing it up a bit would be a good idea.
• Take a break from building sites - There are plenty of other things I have to do before I head off on my travels like setting up a server on my PC (whatever that means), downloading some tunes, backing up my computer, burning my photos to CD, catching up on emails, typing clever things into Facebook etc etc etc. Plus there things I can do with my sites that have nothing to do with their construction like looking at new affiliate programs, approaching potential advertisers for private link sales, researching keywords, learning new skills yadda yadda yadda. All this stuff needs to get done at one point or another so now is as good a time as any.
• Take a break from the online world completely - I have 100,000 things to do in the offline world and I could probably stand to take a break from the computer for a few days. I find when I’m not able to work on my sites for an extended period of time I usually come up with  some good ideas and am really eager to get back to work. A bit of time away while I organise my life might result in some stupendously amazing ideas. Of course I might just veg out, watch lots of TV and eat ice cream but that’s a risk I’m willing to take.

I think working hard initially is a major key to success down the road but I also think that working too hard might turn out to be negative if it saps all my energy and makes me want to assassinate my website.

I’m going to opt for a combo of options one and two. I’ll launch my new site and hope it starts to pay off and spend the next week or so after that working on my living in London site. If that doesn’t bring me back to life then I’ll start doing some non-building things and if all is lost then I’ll have a break from the internet for a few days and see how it goes.

I just need to keep my eye on the prize… more work now means less work while I’m sitting on the beach!

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I’ve been talking for ages about this new site I’ve been working on for what seems like an eternity and it’s finally ready. Well, it’s not actually new (it’s an overhaul of this old site) and it’s not actually finished… but I said last week that I’d unleash the beast today whether or not it was done so here it is, in its half-completed glory!

New Site: Working Holiday Info

Bits that I Still Need to Do:

• Header image - It’s crapola and I need to come up with something better but it’s not at the top of my list just now.
• Uncompleted sections - The Students, Articles, and Contests sections don’t even exist and the Destinations and Jobs sections are works in progress. The Visas bit is pretty much done but there are some small gaps here and there.
• Main page - Need to finish bits and flesh it out a bit more but not sure how.
• Blog - I’ve struggled my way to something that fits with the look of my site but I can’t work out how to get the text and links and stuff to match up. I need to write some posts as well. I think this section will focus on news and contests and maybe some personal observations by me.
• Forum - I haven’t even attempted this yet but I’ll get on the case this week I think. I’ve decided to buy a vBulletin board for $160 but won’t have the benefit of a ‘one click install’ so have to be in the right frame of mind to want to tackle the installation.
• Articles - I’ve got a few ideas up my sleeve and just need to sit down and write.
• Layout - There are some individual pages that I’d like to organise better.

Geez with all the stuff that’s not done it makes me wonder what I’ve been working on these past few months! The visa info has been a mission to compile and my little cartoons have taken plenty of time too.

So I guess I’m curious about what you think of it. Because the thing is only half finished now is the time to chime in with any suggestions or criticism so I can fix it up. I’d be keen to know if you think the navigation is set up well and if there are any sections that aren’t listed that you think would fit well with the site. Anything really! Do your worst, I can take it!!

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Nearly two weeks ago I set myself a deadline to have my latest site done by the end of October. Well… that’s today and I have failed miserably in my task. But setting the deadline was good for me because I worked my arse off. I think I underestimated how much I actually have to do because I’ve barely stopped working since then. My new deadline is Monday and it’s coming out, ready or not. I might not unleash the fury across the internet but I’ll post the link here to hopefully get some feedback from you guys.

Putting so much work in lately has got me thinking about how many hours I’m committing to this and I thought it might be interesting to attempt to get a figure for many hours of work I’ve actually put in. Because I’m working on a site that hasn’t been launched, none of the work I’ve done has directly affected my earnings but I’m still curious to work out a very rough hourly rate.

So I’ve tried to look back through the month and remember how I’ve spent my time. I spent 10 days up in Glasgow where I know I only worked about 5 hours during the entire time. I had one massive weekend when the rugby final was on and that was a write off and my other weekends were all spent working pretty hard, usually much longer than 8 hours a day. After I get home from work I go to the gym, eat dinner, watch some crappy TV (Hollyoaks!) and then do at least 2 solid hours of work unless I’m lured out to the pub after work or have something else on.

So all up my guess for number of hours worked in October is 73. That’s with 5 hours while I was on holiday, two hard working weekends of 20 hours each (sad but true), one weekend where my liver wanted to revolt and my brain didn’t want to work, and 14 weeknights where I did around 2 hours of work each. I usually work more than 2 hours a night so this is a pretty low estimate but it’s a good start.

I’ve conveniently forgotten about the thousands of hours I’ve put in over the past several years but there’s not way I’d be able to figure that out so I might as well make fresh start. I’m going to start a little spreadsheet next month to keep track of the hours I work in November to get a more accurate picture. I’m pretty curious about it myself!

Oh ya, happy Halloween! I can’t believe I’ve become one of those misers who turn all the lights off and try to hide from the kiddies… I am so ashamed.

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I’m about two months away from landing in Manila on a one-way ticket and at the moment I know absolutely nothing about the Philippines. I only recently learned how to spell it! I was bored at work earlier and I thought today would be as good a day as any to get cracking with some travel planning.

I spent most of my time this afternoon looking at maps and Googling things I read about on message boards. I wouldn’t say I’m planning some sort of crazy trip off the beaten path and I’ve noticed lots of gaps in the information that’s available for some pretty basic things. Once I realised this, my travel planning quickly changed gears and became website planning. Instead of jotting down names of hotels and the best places to buy ‘happy’ shakes, I started making a list of the places and things I can’t find anything out about.

It’s not going to help me much when I touch down in Manila without a clue and find myself sleeping in the gutter, but it will give my overall trip a purpose. The plan is to try to fill in as many information gaps as I can while I’m on the road and I think making a list in advance is the best plan because I won’t assume that people will know things, I’ll know exactly what sort of info people will be after because I’m after it as well. But then again if nothing comes of it at least I’ll be able to recommend all the coziest gutters in Manila.

This probably won’t work for places like Paris or the Queensland coast or anywhere with a path that is well worn but for anyone planning a trip that’s a bit off the typical tourist trail then paying attention to what you can’t find out should leave you with some pretty good ideas for websites. When you’re searching for something and mighty Google doesn’t come through, look at it as an opportunity to develop something of your own.

I don’t intend to spend all of my time as a researcher of obscure parts of the Philippines but it makes sense to make little notes here and there since I’ll be going there anyways. If I can pull a bunch of useful bits of information together into a good resource then I could be onto a nice earner.

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