New Years Resolutions 2008
January 11th, 2008
Yes it’s that time of year again. People often use the new year as a basis for setting resolutions such as go to the gym more, lose weight, quit smoking etc. As an eBay ebook seller I find it very useful to use the new year as a time to reflect on my progress during the past year, see if I achieved all my targets and then set new targets for the year ahead. It is something you should consider too because it is a great way to focus on your eBay ebook business, identify the areas in which you are doing well and identify the areas which require improvement.
So looking back at last year’s article I set myself the following targets:
- TO INCREASE THE SIZE OF MY EBAY STORE AND TO KEEP TO MY TARGET OF UPDATING MY EBAY STORE AT LEAST ONCE A MONTH
- TO INCREASE THE NUMBER OF SUBSCRIBERS ON MY MAILING LIST BY AT LEAST 350 SUBSCRIBERS:- I didn’t get an additional 350 subscribers but I came close. My list now contains over 600 subscribers.
- TO CREATE AT LEAST THREE MORE PREMIUM EBOOKS AND SELL THEM VIA EBAY AND MY WEBSITES:- No progress here. I still just have one premium product “How to set up a Successful, Automated Ebook Business on eBay”.
- TO INCREASE MY MONTHLY AFFILIATE EARNINGS:- Yes I have increased my affiliate earnings, largely through increased adsense earnings
- TO CREATE FURTHER RESELLABLE PRODUCTS TO PROMOTE MY EBAY STORE, WEBSITE AND PRODUCTS:- Yes again I have created further resellable ebooks although the majority of these are to promote a new website of mine, not my eBay store or existing websites
- TO BEGIN A GOOGLE ADWORDS CAMPAIGH FOR HOW TO SET UP A SUCCESSFUL, AUTOMATED EBOOK BUSINESS ON EBAY:- Yes I did experiment with Adwords using the advice in Perry Marshall’s Guide to Google Adwords but I found it was costing me a lot more than it was making me. Maybe I need to experiment more but at the moment I don’t have the funds to carry on with it.
So in summary I didn’t achieve everything I wanted to but I did achieve a good few of my targets. This is partially down to me not putting in the neccessary effort and partially because my targets changed during the year. As the year has gone on I’ve found that eBay has become increasingly competitive. As a result my returns from eBay have been declining. I decided that if I was going to be successful online I couldn’t rely solely on eBay and eBay related products. I needed to diversify.
In October I started a brand new website, blog and newsletter in a completely unrelated niche. Since then a lot of my efforts have been focussed on setting this up and generating traffic. I’m not going to reveal the website or blog address in this article because I want to see if I can make it successful without using my existing subscriber base. However, as you can see part of the reason I didn’t achieve all my targets is because my focus changed. A year is a long time and in that time it is likely that your goals will change whether it be a marginal change or a signficant change. I’m still going to continue with this newsletter and keep adding to my eBay store but it is not going to be my sole priority online. Overall, I’m pleased with my progress during the year. The only thing I’m dissapointed with is that I didn’t get more premium products out there.
So now that I’ve measured my progress I need to outline my targets for the year ahead. Since I now have a new website, blog and newsletter my targets will take these into account:
- TO INCREASE THE SIZE OF MY EBAY STORE AND UPDATE IT AT LEAST ONCE A MONTH:- Even though eBay isn’t going to be my only focus over the next year I do not want to neglect it. The best way to do this is through regular updates.
- TO INCREASE THE NUMBER OF SUBSCRIBERS ON BOTH MY MAILING LISTS:- I still want to increase the size of this newsletter. However, I also want to increase the size of my new mailing list too.
- TO CREATE AND SELL MORE PREMIUM PRODUCTS:- I really want to get some more premium products out there. In particular there are plenty of opportunities for the creation of premium products for visitors to my new website, blog and newsletter.
- TO INCREASE MY MONTHLY AFFILIATE EARNINGS:- I have already increased my adsense earnings in the last few months as a result of my new blog. I want to continue to increase my adsense earnings during the coming year and also increase my earnings from other affiliate programs. My new website, blog and newsletter provide a lot of affiliate opportunities so this is a big one for me.
- TO CREATE FURTHER RESELLABLE EBOOKS TO PROMOTE MY VARIOUS WEBSITES:- I already have resellable ebooks out there to promote my eBay store and related websites, plus a few resellable ebooks out there to promote the new website, blog and newsletter. In the coming year I want to create even more.
- TO IMPROVE MY ARTICLE MARKETING EFFORTS:- In the last few months (pretty much since the creation of my new blog, website and newsletter) I have spent a lot of time reading up on article marketing. In particular I’ve been looking to improve the title of my articles and improve my resource boxes. Since I’ve done this I’ve really noticed an improvement in the traffic my articles have been generating. In the coming year I plan to improve my article marketing further and generate even more traffic.
- TO FOCUS ON SOCIAL BOOKMARKING:- I’d heard of social bookmarking before but never really tried it until a few weeks ago. Social bookmarking sites are basically sites you can submit your webpages, articles or blogs too. In particular they’re very useful for submitting blog posts. Once you have submitted to a social bookmarking site other people will see the post and if they like it they can vote on it. If your post proves popular you can get a large amount of traffic from these sites. I’ve posted a some of my blog posts from the new blog to various social bookmarking sites and really noticed the increase in traffic. My aim for the new year is to submit all my posts from all my blogs to the social bookmarking sites.
- TO SETUP SOME SQUIDOO LENSES:- Squidoo is another thing I hadn’t tried until a few weeks ago. Squidoo lenses are similar to blogs and have the potential to generate huge amounts of traffic. I plan to set up a squidoo lens for my eBay ebook store and newsletter plus one for my new blog, website and newsletter.
- TO UPDATE ALL MY BLOGS REGULARLY:- I have been keeping my new blog up to date but I have been neglecting this blog and The Ebook Cavern Reviews Blog. Therefore, I want to maintain the standard I have set with my new blog try to update my other blogs more regularly.
- TO GET THIS NEWSLETTER OUT ON TIME EVERY MONTH:- As regular subscribers to this newsletter will know I have had problems getting this newsletter out on time. However, with better organisation I know that I can get it out on time every month and that’s what I want to achieve for next year.
So there you have it. Quite a lot to keep me going for 2008. But what’s the relevance to you? If you haven’t set targets for your online business in the past nows the time to start. Think about what you have achieved online in the last year. What are you happy with? Where do you think you need to improve? Then use this as a basis for creating some of your own targets for 2008.
Another key point to take from this article is that the Internet is constantly evolving which means your targets are likely to change during the year. If you don’t revise them accordingly you will get left behind? When I started my eBay store I never thought that I would be running a newsletter or blog and I had never heard of article marketing or social bookmarking. I never thought that I would be diversifying from my eBay related business either but that’s exactly what’s happened. To be a long term success on the Internet you will have to keep up to date with these changes and set your targets accordingly.
The third thing you should take from this article is that it does not matter if you don’t achieve all your targets. By setting yourself targets and trying to achieve them you are doing more than most by taking action. Even though you may not achieve all your targets you will make progress during the year and ultimately that is what you want.
So what have you achieved in 2007? What are you going to achieve in 2008? If you don’t take the time to reflect you are unlikely to achieve your goals. Write down what you want from the coming year and 2008 could well prove prosperous for you.
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