Did you start AM for the money or because of the passion for a niche? (25)
Did you start AM for the money or because of the passion for a niche?
Hey guys,
In 2006 I came across a PayPal pyramid thing that promises me to get rich real soon.
It didn't work of course but I promised myself to become a rich person some day doing internet marketing.
I googled lot's of stuff about making money online and eventually signed up the the warrior forum purchasing LOT's of WSO's (which I never found that crappy place)
Anyway, one WSO was about making money in the adult space.
And while I made some nice money for the past 2 years I asked myself "What the fuck am I doing?"
Do I even enjoy this market with people copying shit from others.
Promoting adult dating offers while I knew it was all fake.
I made about €5k per month, but it didn't satisfy my needs at all.
I couldn't talk with anybody about this, and I just wanted live social contact instead of disappearing in my room.
And someone "good job Dennis!" would also be very nice so now and then.
For the last few months I tried to figure out what my true passion is, but believe it or not, I couldn't find any.
So what should I do now.
Should I let my dreams go and just find a dayjob where I actually get compliments for my accomplishents?
Should I just continue in the adult space for 1 or 2 years and get the money I deserve?
Both things are an option here.
So back to my basic question: Are you in it for the money? Or do you actually enjoy the niche you're in? Or both?
~Dennis
in short - both
there is a recent thread covering morality, money and enjoyment http://stmforum.com/forum/showthread...light=facebook
I started AM for fun.
I started AM because of the money i saw affiliates are making but i stayed in this niche because of the passion i developed.
there are a lot of different niches you can make your living with, what i love most about AM is that the success and failures are very easy to analyse.
its all in the numbers, you might feel that you are giving everything you got but the results don't lie. either you make profit or you lose.
I started to get out of a job/ career I was beginning to despise (construction). It was also beginning to wear my body out.
As I've gone on and found a small degree of success it has now developed into a passion where I can't imagine doing anything else for the rest of my career. The AM space is constantly evolving and there is so much to learn and test that anyone with an inquisitive mind is never short of inspiration.
Making money is now a pleasant side effect of doing something I love so its the icing on the cake for me but if I had to start all over again ,for whatever reason, then Im pretty confident I could get something going again.
From a moral perspective I have zero qualms about what I do, when you look at the damage big business like the sugar, tobacco and fast food industry is doing to mankind then I can sleep safely at night.
Bluntly: money.
I re-read 4 Hour Work Week, realised that the approach he was describing was exactly what I needed to take my filmmaking up several notches (because filmmaking is expensive ), and started on a systematic search of all available methods of generating income in a "muse" - ie not-full-time - fashion.
The search ended when I found AM - or rather, about 4 months afterward when I had my first successful campaign.
And that approach has subsequently meant that I get to make films using the same technology as the guys making the "Avengers" movies, and rapidly update to the latest tech as it arrives, rather than struggling to make ends meet and having lengthy debates over whether I can afford to buy a $15 camera mount, as most other filmmakers do.
Originally Posted by dennis
Isolation will be costly in any niche/field.
I got into it because of the tech side the automation the checks just coming in LOL.
But I know what you mean every one outside affiliate tells you to find your passion and follow it otherwise it wont work. It's only half true.
I have never had a passion beside web tech and music. But once any campaign makes money it excites me so much I just want it to got to the next level to get the same high.
Now I am in it for the ideas the marketing and the money. I love online marketing too much thats my passion 
I started Affiliate Marketing because I want the freedom to live wherever I want. I don't want to live out my whole life in the same city, taking the occasional vacation. That would be hell.
Honestly, I wanted to go to college so that I could find a job that allowed me to travel the world. When I found out about AM I thought: wait, why take the chance to get a job so I can travel the world, when I can just be self-employed and have all of that?
The decision was easy.
I've always thought that the advice to follow your passion was rather misguided.
If you can find a job that matches with your passion that is great, but just because you follow your passion doesn't mean success will follow.
awesome chart @cmdeal. although I'm convinced this shall be correct, whats the source of it?
there is tons of research about occupation, purpose, happiness and its intersections. not even to mention aspects like work/life balance - if you believe in that concept. what I personally found is that this industry is full of very special people, some of which not only use affiliate marketing as a way of "getting rich quick" (which will usually not happen anyways) but as a foundation for a lifestyle of freedom (think 4HWW and @caurmen 's comment above). usually a regular job and even many types of "self-employment" do not offer such a level of freedom.
I'd strongly recommend you to find a group of peers, maybe even a partner and a small team of like-minded people. with them try to build a real business, one that provides value in one way or another and that helps you to grow. this way you can have the freedom to pro-actively lead your live into a direction that you are passionate about without sacrificing that you get lost in lonesome thoughts about the meaning of life... : )
Originally Posted by Phil
Because of the passion for data analysis and sales!
@cmdeal: interesting research and nice page, thank you.
I started AM for the money, more flexible work/life balance and to avoid working for anyone else. Having worked for myself for 17 years now the prospect of working for anyone else gives me the shivers - I would be an awful employee!
There is never any shortage of things to learn and so never dull. If you're not learning your basically doing something wrong.
Originally Posted by cmdeal
If you can find a job that matches with your passion that is great, but just because you follow your passion doesn't mean success will follow.
Success if relative though.
Originally Posted by cmdeal
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Personally, I started because of a multitude of reasons. Passion being one of them, but I knew what the oportunities and my developing skillsets were. I do both design and AM and I absolutely love both. Hobbies = jobs = all-in-one-happy.
Reasons for starting AM:
- Extremely curious when it comes to it - What's going to work? What's next? What do I need to research to understand the targeted audience? Should I risk it with the limited data that I possess?
- For some twisted reason that I'm not aware of, I actually enjoy reading the data and analyzing it.
- The money - I come from a shitty country and had a rough start.
- The urge and need to help my family.
- The risk - I love this. I love the whole game of spending money to make money, super thrilling.
- The entire process of an AM campaign from start to finish - that's what I put my focus on.
- Getting something to profit after careful research, planning, split-tests, hypotheses and so on is very satisfying.
So I'd say both, but niche not being a single niche, instead it's this whole marketing thing.
So how much time are you dedicating to AM (let's say an "average week", if you excuse the generalisation) and how much to film making and associated tasks? +how does that compare to when you started out in AM.
Originally Posted by caurmen
I'm an introverted tech nerd whose hobby has always been computers, technology, design, writing. For me A.M. was a no brainer; it was my passion and making money with it came as a side effect. Then I met more and more people, and it continued to spiral into more and more money.
To this day, I blog for FREE because its my hobby, other people started their blog as a long sales funnel eventually to drop the ball with a coaching programme or a guru course. I on the other hand, started it for fun to keep notes and just to write because I like it. Funny enough, I made a lot of money from my blog - but again I didn't start it to make money from it, it just happened sort of like how A.M. happens.
Now-a-days, making money with AM is like keeping score, I like to compare it to playing warcraft. To be really good at WoW you need to play it 12 hours a day at least; to be super good at AM you need to 'play it' all the time. I'm lucky I am playing a game thats my hobby and passion, and $$$ is how I keep score.
I got into it after starting a lead gen biz and learning about using pubs for traffic.
I got into the publisher side to enter verticals faster than launching offers.
Our company was doing affiliate marketing, but our *passion* led us to create an ad network for other fellow marketers and pubs as we believed our unique insight into the niche of this business enabled us to create a more targeted and advertiser friendly platform.
Can't speak for anyone else on here but it is because we followed our passion to create our own customized CPM network - and not just to inflate our bank account- that we managed to be successful AND happy in our professional pursuits and as a result, in our personal lives 
You seem like a very insightful and conscientious person so hiring a team as someone above suggested or starting your own business might be a way to go. If you're not ready for that yet, have you considered doing other related forms of marketing? I think you might be very successful working as a social media manager or a marketing coordinator for an advertising or a marketing company. If you'd rather be doing 'meaningful' marketing or PR you can always try applying to a charity or some kind of social movement company (the Pure Water Movement is the one that pops to the top of my mind) as well while working as an AMer on the side.
Everyone hits a wall or a career crossroad, but only you know which path is the right one for you. I also suggest reading some blog entries from Charles Ngo as I believe he wrote about being in a similar situation when he was in his mid 20's. Good luck
money
I started because of money, I was looking for ways to avoid a 5/9 job and landed in adult AM. During all those years, it kinda became my passions too and I don't really think I could stop doing AM completely. I'm on my way to set the world record for number of years in AM 
Started because i saw 2 friends with really nice cars! then i noticed it will make me free from time and worklocation and then i started reading and saw i also loved it! (not the technical part tho)
Enjoyment, simple as. What could be more fascinating than exploring the deepest caves of ones own imagination and making money from it. Watching how millions of people react to the words you type, how a simple change can make users much more engaged. A truly fascinating industry to be a part of.
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