If you do this for a living...

[Justin]

If affiliate marketing or something similar is your only source of income, I have a few questions.

- What time do you work each day? Im thinking unless you have a site that delivers news/updates, then you probably don't need to be up at 7AM.

- Do you work weekends or take them off like a normal job?

- Is there a certain type of insurance that someone who is self employed needs? Or do you use your spouse's insurance to cover you?

I'd really appreciate some info from those of you who could help me out. Thanks.

[adioking]

aasdf

[Jeremy]

Great post Justin.

Although I have a few other interests such as real estate, the majority of my income is derived off the internet. I do treat this like a real job as I am the bread winner for my family........(and unfortunatelty my wife likes expensive bread )

Although I could work out of my house, I lease office space about 5 minutes from my house. Not only does it get me away from the distractions at home, it makes me treat this business like a real job. I usually like to get to the office around 9:00 and I generally work until 4:30 or 5:00. In the summer though I do like to golf and take the kids to the park, ect. One of the perks of owning your own business I suppose.

Although I don't go to the office on weekends I still feel like I am always on the computer at home. So the answer would be yes, I do work weekends.

Don't get me started on health insurance in the U.S. It's absolutely ridiculous. My wife doesn't work so I am forced to get my insurance for us and two kids through a private plan. This costs around $800 USD a month and the coverage is not even that great.

The biggest peice of advice I would give though if you choose to do this fulltime, make sure you work fulltime. Even once you're making a decent living you can't just go on cruise control. You always have to be coming up with new ideas and maintaining the exsisting revenue streams.

Being a fulltime poker affiliate is the best job in the world. Of course I am biased though.

[Dave]

Don't get me started on health insurance in the U.S. It's absolutely ridiculous. My wife doesn't work so I am forced to get my insurance for us and two kids through a private plan. This costs around $800 USD a month and the coverage is not even that great.

Wow J ... I don't pay that much for health insurance for a whole year here in Canada.


80% of my income is from internet marketing.

I wake up when I feel like it.

Maybe 8:00 AM in the winter..... 10:00 in the summer..... mountain biking... fishing and beach bumming etcetera.

I do spend up to 16 hours a day attached to a computer most days even when I'm at the beach..... but I don't have to.

I'm just a tad greedy and marketing is very addictive....it's a money game just like poker!

Total freedom is what being an internet marketer is all about.

And that for me is absolutely priceless.

[hoursurfing]

Originally Posted by Dave

Total freedom is what being an internet marketer is all about.

And that for me is absolutely priceless.

Got that right. Its not about money. Working on the internet is the best self employeed job you could have imo. When you step back and look at the money you build along the way it's great but that's not why most poeple do it, I think.

Maybe Jeremy should put up a disclaimer on the bottom of PAW. I mean [censored] I'm becoming more addicted to this crap and it's only getting worse. Anyone else think about poker affiliating 24-7?

Avg Day: Wake up 11:30, check stats, eat, work til 6:00pm, play nine holes, and work til 2:30am, sleep, do it over.

Later

[AceKicker]

I went full-time a little over a year ago. For me there's no such thing as a typical day now. There are times when I work every day of the week, not because I have to, but because I'm working on a new site or a new project that keeps me interested. I remember when I had a regular corporate job, it was really hard to get up in the mornings. I was usually late to work at least 3 times per week. I always thought that when I had a job like internet marketing, I would sleep in late everyday. It hasn't been the case. It's not that I can't sleep in, it's because I don't want to sleep in. I guess when you're happier with life, you want to get up as early as possible to enjoy it.

The main reason for my career change was freedom. Sometimes I go weeks without doing any work. But sometimes I get so involved with a project that it's all i do - but by choice, not necessity.

I like to go to different coffee shops and work there. It gets me out of the house. In Austin, there seems to be coffee shops everywhere - all with wi-fi access. I work about 15-20 hours per week now. I worked more hours when I first started out, though. I just hope I can keep the dream alive for as long as I can.

[J S]

I do this full time, along with running a live poker league at local sports bars and restaurants. I have employees who handle most of that, and my business partner and I focus most of our time on our network of websites. As far as work, I normally get into our office around 9am-10am and work until around 6pm.

The freedom is great, I've got a wife and two kids and my wife works part time as an elementary school counselor... pretty much strictly for the insurance benefits and to get her out of the house so she doesn't go insane dealing with our two kids all day, haha.

As far as how many hours I work... this is for sure a full time job and I probably spend 50-60 hours a week actually working on something, although everyone who has a good site is really at work 24/7 if you ask me. The site works even when you're asleep.

It has taken 2 years or hard work, and self taught knowledge, much of it gleaned from these very forums, to start making real money online, but it is paying off. Plus, if the poker boom goes away, or the laws change at the very least I've learned skills that can translate in to virtually any business that want's to do business via the web.

One thing we've learned is that you constantly need to be working on new projects and having goals set and timelines laid out with plans of attack.

We started with the poker website idea, but it got virtually no traffic, then we decided to incorporate a live poker league at local sports bars and restaurants to kick start our website, and to get some revenue coming in... once we got that going, we realized that we sure could use a way to train our poker dealers, so we hired a pro poker dealer and created a poker dealing training course. Now we sell it for just under $200 per copy and believe it or not, we do sell a few thousand dollars worth per month of this ebook. To go along with our dealer training book, we realized that we need a training course for people who want to run and direct poker tournaments... this ebook course is nearly done. In conjunction with that, we have another product about to be ready to go that will make others who are running live poker leagues have the ability to dynamically create their own leaderboards and manage their poker league...

i guess the long story short is that you always have to stay busy and have a set goal or project that you are working on... do not rest on your laurels and think that the MGR you've built up will maintain itself... you always need to add new players and new revenue streams.

[GregK]

The freedom is by far the most important to me.

[mongoose]

- What time do you work each day?
> mostly the hours when i'm awake, although i've been known to dream about work too.

Im thinking unless you have a site that delivers news/updates, then you probably don't need to be up at 7AM.
> nope, you don't need to have a set start time.

- Do you work weekends or take them off like a normal job?
> what's a "normal" job? yes, i work weekends.

- Is there a certain type of insurance that someone who is self employed needs? Or do you use your spouse's insurance to cover you?
> used to use the spouse's, but she's at home now helping with the kids. we pay for health insurance now. gotta do what you gotta do.

[corpfan1]

I am ready to blow up this thread...it is driving me bananas!!!

I have been facing a dilemma for over a year now.

I am starting to make more money doing this then my full-time job and that is with doing the affiliating a limited amount of time because my day job takes up ALL MY TIME.

I teach for a living right now and the extra work we have to do outside of regular hours is driving me up the wall and stressing me out. Yet, I am afraid to quit the "stable", "steady" job filled with full benefits and an awesome pension.

I am so stuck in what to do...I would LOVE the freedom of this being my full time gig and would definitely excel at it.

I guess the thing I am most afraid of, is the business changing drastically and having to go back to work eventually!!

What do you guys think? Will this ever come to an end, or change enough that we will have to find another revenue stream?