One year and $200k later... (25)
I dreamed about being able to make a post like this. And thank God, a year and a half after first joining STM, I can finally do so.
To start this story off, let me begin by including a snippet of my first intro post here on 6/30/2013.
Well, that "month or two" turned into 8 more long months of hard grinding and little to no success. But my breakthrough finally came.
It was not easy, but once things did click for me, they made all those sleepless nights, entire weekends sitting in front of the computer and months on end with barely any entertainment except the sound of my keyboard so totally worth it.
The Good News
So far this year I have generated about $200,000 in revenue, with about half of that being profit. On my best day I was able to hit about $2.7k with ~$1.7k in profit. I know that may not seem like much to some of you, but considering where I was a year ago today, it's almost a miracle to me. I had barely $800 in credit, very little liquid assets and the incessant pressure of not knowing where the money was going to come from to pay our bills.
Well, all that has changed now. And I thought I'd drop by here to give thanks for all the incredible information I got from you guys. It all started here. I may have only been here one month, but during that month I turned half the guides on here into PDFs and went back to them whenever I needed them.
Looking back, even simple posts from some of you guys made me look into stuff that ended up helping me tremendously. Reading back through my old posts, I remember having tons of server issues. Well, reading what some of you guys had to say on the issue drove me to learning how to set up and optimize my own self-managed VPS, setting up Nginx, tweaking MySQL for maximum performance, and more -- allowing me to have a bulletproof server that could handle loads of traffic and process redirects super fast, for a fraction of what I was paying before for an un-optimized managed, mediocre server.
Stuff like that proved to be invaluable, especially since I was bootstrapping.
What I've Learned
The most important thing I've learned during this time is, DON'T GIVE UP. I even made it bold to emphasize how important that is. It might sound simple, but it's the key. You have no idea how many times I felt like giving up. Like throwing in the towel. You have no idea how hard it was sometimes when I was talking to my friends about what I was planing to do and what my goals were, and feeling completely ridiculous by their lack of support. I felt like giving up so many times when failures were just followed by more and more failures. Sometimes I felt as if nothing could possibly go right. But that's just a big veil of negativity you have to find a way to break through. Find a way to boost your confidence, read a motivating book, pray, just do something. Don't quit.
I have more technical advice to give, but I'll probably make a new thread for that. Today is my birthday and I just wanted to drop in and say thank you. Not to sound overly religious or anything, but I thank God for leading me here and allowing me to find you guys. (I don't think you have to be religious to be grateful to 'God' for blessings in your life). And if you guys from IMG are reading, I want to thank you guys as well. I spent some time with you, and your help proved to be invaluable to me also. Just giving credit where credit is due.
Next Up
I'm at a point right now where I just finished riding a big wave. That wave has since settled down and it's time to find a new wave. Or, make my own wave. And by this I mean that the biggest offers I was running have since been paused, or simply not converting the way they were. The space I was in has gotten a little tougher, at least I'd say.
So moving forward, I'd like to start putting an emphasis on building my own business -- something I have more control over, that won't get paused by a network; an asset that I own. I have some ideas already, so that's something I'll be working on in addition to running campaigns.
For now, I hope to continue learning from you guys and hopefully be able to contribute to helping others. Any questions, just ask. God bless.
Here's a list of some threads that really helped me out back when I was starting out, most of which have information that is still very relevant for 2015. (In no particular order)
I'll continue adding more to the list as I stumble upon them again.
★ Pure 100% STM Gold, All Organic, Non-GMO Money Threads ★
Secrets of Super High Volume Affiliates
$500,000 Profit - An Old Ringtone Campaign On Facebook.
Bing Ads -- Are you leaving money on the table?
How to run 10m visits with $15 a month wordpress + ec2
Taking A Landing Page from 2 Seconds' Loading Time To 34 Milliseonds Loading Time
Loads Of Tips To Make Your Web Server Fast, Secure And Stable
Media Buying 101
Rules Psychology: How to Make it Pay
Part 8: Landing Pages, The Bridge To Victory
All Of STM's Threads On Server Security
This is just awesome!
It is so easy to give up when things look tough, but YOU did not. You persisted and persisted. And you have succeeded!
Well done to you!
''Most people overestimate what they can do in a month and they underestimate what they can do in a year''
Setting short term goals in IM is usually fruitless
Well done!
You're the man! Thanks for posting this story man really sick!
Common theme, don't give up. You will succeed
Thanks for giving back in the energy of motivating others man, this will further fuel you to rise even more!
Another great success story.
Thanks for the motivation.
Boss! 
Awesome! Congrats and Happy Birthday!
Congratulations on your success and happy birthday!
That really encourage me!
Happy Birthday mate!! Inspiring as hell
Smashed it out of the park man!
"You have no idea how hard it was sometimes when I was talking to my friends about what I was planing to do and what my goals were, and feeling completely ridiculous by their lack of support. I felt like giving up so many times when failures were just followed by more and more failures. Sometimes I felt as if nothing could possibly go right."
I hear this being echoed by a tonne of affiliates.
Hanging in there is the difference between going back to that 9-5 and absolute freedom.
Congrats for sticking in there!
Congrats on your success and Happy Birthday! The part about thinking of giving up spoke to me - been there . The friends that don't get why you want to quit the 9-5 and control your own destiny, they aren't the ones that will help you on your next business journey. Stay motivated, keep working, build your own offer - you know you can do it! 
Congratulation & Happy Birthday. Your story reminded my starting day in 2007. It took me full 8 months work to see my first dollar from internet marketing.
Great work dude!
I love reading posts like this always a good way to start a Monday morning 
Amazing stuff mate.
Well done. You deserve that succes!
Congratulations, and happy birthday! I'm just starting out and reading your thread gives me so much motivation. I'm looking forward to your update on which threads helped you out the most.
If it were possible to say "Thanks" twice, I would have done! It's your birthday and you do us a gift ... very motivating.
So, thanks again and happy birthday, you deserve it!
Great man, Never give up , see my tag, great song , unfortanly they fucked it up
Thanks to everyone for the kind words and birthday wishes.
I went ahead and updated my OP with a list of some of the threads that really helped me when I first joined up here. I'll be adding more as I re-discover threads from long ago that I may have missed. And while many of them may be a year or two old, much of the information contained within them is still very relevant.
Hope you guys enjoy. Now, let's continue stacking that money.
Great stuff. Congratulations!
You are a hero! Happy birthday man. God bless
Congrats man!
The 'never give up' theory is different for everyone. For someone people it takes months, others it takes year. The end goal is always the same if you don't give up.
You don't need to be super smart or creative. Keep going, put the effort and you will make it.
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