I always get astonished when some of the best ideas fails whereas dumb ideas gets wide public acceptance. Anyway that is the hard and harsh fact one has to accept in business. When these dumb ideas become popular, they are no more dumb and I would call them as a new trend.
I was going through some articles on business on internet on problogger, I came across an old post on Milliondollarhomepage, which I already read a year ago in local news paper. As I read this again, I got curious about this concept and went to http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/.
As the home page was getting loaded, it appeared to be a very simple website that one could create by a couple of days work. The first thought that struck me - Every one and Anyone can create such a site so whats so special that he made million dollars out of it ? I knew that the founder made million dollars by selling pixes on the website to the advertisers so it was not something new to me.
After the web page got loaded, I see a lot of advertisements on this site. Initially it appeared to me that small and medium sized companies bought the pixels on this page but after watching Yahoo and Timesonline, I realized there were a few big firms too. Though the idea was very simple, hats off to the founder Alex Tew for the right marketing techniques.
That gives us a new (I think I should say old) lesson to learn, A simple idea with great marketing is always better than a great idea with no marketing.
The guy has already sold all the pixels on his blog so now it shows the message "You're too late. There are no more pixels available :( " when I tried to buy a few pixels.
While googling I have come across a lot of sites which are replicas of this but they haven't made much revenue. Is that because the advertisers don't want to advertise any more on such million pixels pages ? I don't think so. If Alex adds one more million pixels to his site, I am confident that he can sell those new pixels in short amount of time. So what I meant here is, the market hasn't dried up and it is still open. Then why did the other websites fail ? I think the others lagged on the marketing. They haven't gained any popularity.
What all happened is history but that set a new trend in the internet business. It emphasized that the market is always open for any kind of ideas. All you have to do is target it at right market. How you do that is the challenge.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Freelancing is it really worthy ? (Part 2)
Im back with the continuation. I have answered a few question in the previous post. Now let me answer a few more.
What all I can do ?
Anything. Yes, I mean it. It could be programming, tutoring, data entry, blogging for someone else, writing articles, photography... the possibilities are endless. Try google search and you will see a lot of such things. There are a lot of internet scams so you have to be slightly careful in figuring out the right freelancing projects.
Advantages and Disadvantages
Let me start with Advantages so that you feel comfortable.
1. The biggest advantage as I already pointed out is the flexibility. Whether you work from 9 AM to 5 PM or 5 PM to 9 AM is your wish ;-)
2. No one would ever question you for going late to office, no one would call you for team meetings, you don't need to work under someone who doesn't know what the problem is but keeps suggesting solutions , keep on bugging you about the status for every half an hour(often a manager).
Let me emphasize that Im not quoting my situation here.
3. You decide what you do. If dislike some work, you need not do that. Often, in freelancing work, you bid for the projects that you are interested in so there is no one who forces you to do the work you hate.
Now coming to the disadvantages
1. Its often hard to predict the revenue you generate so sometimes it could frustrate you in the initial stages. In the initial stages you may feel that the 9 to 5 job with lesser but an assured pay is better than a fluctuating revenue.
2. You have to be a Jack of all trades. If you restrict yourself to a specific skill set then making a decent life out of freelancing may be difficult unless there are a lot of projects around your skill set.
3. Once you work through a few days and have earned some money, you might feel like taking a break. You have to keep yourself motivated... that obviously is a challenge.
4. Often, people tend to identify you by your company. When you are a freelancer its hard to get the same recognition and sometimes its hard to explain what you do (unless the other person is from a similar background).
As always there are Pros and Cons in this situation too and you are the person who have to decide.
What would I do if I were you ?
I knew you would have this question in mind. As a matter of fact, I am a fan of dual pack (Work on 9 to 5 Job + freelancing in part time) and I would suggest people doing it until they get work enough in freelancing and get projects for the next 1 year.
Though I don't focus much on freelancing, whenever I work on projects I get paid around 15 to 20$ per hour which I think is decent number.
What all I can do ?
Anything. Yes, I mean it. It could be programming, tutoring, data entry, blogging for someone else, writing articles, photography... the possibilities are endless. Try google search and you will see a lot of such things. There are a lot of internet scams so you have to be slightly careful in figuring out the right freelancing projects.
Advantages and Disadvantages
Let me start with Advantages so that you feel comfortable.
1. The biggest advantage as I already pointed out is the flexibility. Whether you work from 9 AM to 5 PM or 5 PM to 9 AM is your wish ;-)
2. No one would ever question you for going late to office, no one would call you for team meetings, you don't need to work under someone who doesn't know what the problem is but keeps suggesting solutions , keep on bugging you about the status for every half an hour(often a manager).
Let me emphasize that Im not quoting my situation here.
3. You decide what you do. If dislike some work, you need not do that. Often, in freelancing work, you bid for the projects that you are interested in so there is no one who forces you to do the work you hate.
Now coming to the disadvantages
1. Its often hard to predict the revenue you generate so sometimes it could frustrate you in the initial stages. In the initial stages you may feel that the 9 to 5 job with lesser but an assured pay is better than a fluctuating revenue.
2. You have to be a Jack of all trades. If you restrict yourself to a specific skill set then making a decent life out of freelancing may be difficult unless there are a lot of projects around your skill set.
3. Once you work through a few days and have earned some money, you might feel like taking a break. You have to keep yourself motivated... that obviously is a challenge.
4. Often, people tend to identify you by your company. When you are a freelancer its hard to get the same recognition and sometimes its hard to explain what you do (unless the other person is from a similar background).
As always there are Pros and Cons in this situation too and you are the person who have to decide.
What would I do if I were you ?
I knew you would have this question in mind. As a matter of fact, I am a fan of dual pack (Work on 9 to 5 Job + freelancing in part time) and I would suggest people doing it until they get work enough in freelancing and get projects for the next 1 year.
Though I don't focus much on freelancing, whenever I work on projects I get paid around 15 to 20$ per hour which I think is decent number.
Im willing to pay you $$ can you host my bot ?
Yes, Im looking out for someone who can host a bot that I have written. Its a program written in Java. I wish to get it running 24x7.
For this help, Im ready to pay some money. If you already have an account where you and if you can host java bots, Im fine in hosting it through your account (if your service provider allows it).
Anyone willing to offer me bot hosting service can post a comment here with their mail address. I'll revert back with the details.
Im available on twitter - http://twitter.com/sbblogger
For this help, Im ready to pay some money. If you already have an account where you and if you can host java bots, Im fine in hosting it through your account (if your service provider allows it).
Anyone willing to offer me bot hosting service can post a comment here with their mail address. I'll revert back with the details.
Im available on twitter - http://twitter.com/sbblogger
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