Its been a while since I last posted, and whils there has been plenty of good news, boy has there been plenty of bad. It seems I am facing failure right in the face, every venture I had has not taken off as expected, and whilst one can hold on and hope things will be better soon, bills need to be paid. I will be meeting with a guy who I consider to be my Mentor in a few days, it will be good to meet with him because it has been a couple of months now since we last met, but he is one guy that gets you pumped up and hoping for the best.

Well the journey continues and we all knew it was not going to be easy,  I had just hoped it would be more fruitful by now.

I wish you wealth, health and happiness.

Now I have always been a sceptical when it comes to these online money making schemes etc. However the Arbitrage Consipracy Report really caught my attention. Firstly because the intial report was free, secondly it was quite detailed. Yes of course there was hype about the launch yada yada yada, but the concept made sense, particularly because it takes elements of Financial Trading and brings it to Google. Now I am not sure how long it is going to last but it does work, I made $31 to prove it. Now of course that is not alot and that was at an expense of $17 (PPC Campaign via Google Adwords, but a $13 profit or 76% profit is still one hell of a profit! As % that is phenomal and the work I did was very little. All I need to do now is replicate it and “Aymens your Uncle”, I too should be making $100,000 a day!! To be honest I would be very satisfied with $1,000 a day for an hour or two work a day, that sounds like easy money to me and $100,000 a day would essentially mean one would be spending between $20K – $30K on PPC traffic. That is a lot. So to get there one needs to have deep pockets, so I see this more as a gradual growth.

There are a couple of issues I foresee though, (1) Google starts to clamp down on it, but I can’t see that happening, because they obviously benefit from it financially. (2) The Merchants do not see it as a viable business model. I could see this happening, because for instance, I made $31 on a Acai Berry Trial Campaign. The Customer had to pay $6.95 for Shipping and Handling and they would get 3 free bottles. You can view the landing page here (www.acaiberryselect.com). Simple mathematics tells me the people behind Acai Berry have actually made an initial loss by paying me a hefty commission. But they have taken the calculated risk I hope, of saying ‘Well foro every person that trials it, they go on to come back and order more at full RRP and they order $xxx worth per annum’, so in principle the Merchant should benefit. Lets hope!. (3) Efficient Market Principles. Many economist have written about the existence of efficient markets which are largely driven by Supply and Demand.  No we all understand that basics of this principle, but what happens when to many Affiliate Marketers chase too few good campaigns, the price of clicking goes up. Of course there are a number of other factors such as quality of PPC Advert that prompts the initial click, but if the CPC or Bid price is stilll high then chance are you will be at the bottom of the list if you are bidding relatively low and some schmuck who does know what they are doing bids high. Can I foresee that happening, certainly so, if the download figures of the Arbitrage Report are anything to go by many people will at least try it out, so that could mean for the next six months whilst the chancers are getting weeded out it might be a good idea to be testing on a small scale before increasing budgets etc once the chancers are bled dry.

The principle behind this is very simple, buy traffic at a low price and “sell” it at a high price i.e. if it converts you earn a nice bit of commission.  I was analysing my Google Adwords stats, and whilst they make for pitiful viewing, that fact is it took under 100 clicks to make $31 dollars. Obviously I will need a lot more clicks from that, but the TEST phase has convinced me. I obviously can’t afford to get on the Aymen program, but one thing we have to remember with the Internet is information will get leaked sooner or later, so I will be patient.

If you are interested in finding out more about Affiliate Marketing go to Never Blue and sign up to their program and you too could be on your way to making some decent money. If you want to download the free copy of that Arbitrage Report then click here.

We have all heard it before “You have to think outside the box”. I always knew what it meant, but I never realised how powerful it could be until recently. Researching the launch of my Internet Traffic Brokerage business, I realised in order to make it successfully I would have to do what everyone else isn’t. Sounds simple at first, but the truth is it makes sense. You see, many successful people have ‘swam against the other fishes’. Whilst everyone else was going left, they went right. That is the same for the Internet and making money on-line. I am a strong believer in modelling, but being an exact carbon copy (plus twin) will not help much, because there will be nothing unique or special about you.

I recently posted about the Arbitrage Conspiracy Report (visit Blog Post Here and Download Free 25 Page Report Here). I looked into it in  a bit more detail, and it makes total sense. Here is the challenge and the downside (and its a big one), this morning I received an email from them saying “Over 162,667 visitorsto The Arbitrage Conspiracy in the first 4 days!”. Now that is definitely not swimming against the fishes, and lets put that into perspective, perhaps 10% will actually try to implement it, that is circa 16,000 odd. Surely the Bid PPC prices will go up and the market will be saturated, basic economics principles of supply and demand. Then I thought to myself, well a large number of these people are likely to be concentrating in a specific area, so it is really down to finding my niche. The Internet is global, which means sitting in front of my computer here in Scotland, I can market to anywhere in the world, with a click of bottom and a few choice words, and the beauty with Google Adwords, is that it lets you do the very easily thanks to Geo-locations etc. So I have found my niche, it will be interesting to see what response I get.

Another Little gem for getting up and running and will save you about £20 – £60 ($25 – $80) is by finding websites which offer Google Adwords Voucher with the purchase. With my web hosting company I was able to get £50 worth of vouchers. You can only use one code for one account but it still gives you the opportunity to open a couple of accounts and TEST.

I love all things money related! I of course am building a billionaire fortune right. I received an email today, from one of the many email lists that I am on. This one caught my attention thought, particularly because it came at a  very timely moment (long story), the subject of the email was something like “$100,000 a day in earnings”. Now my first thought was this had to be one of those Nigerian emails that had been diverted through this email marketers website . marketing list. I read on, and have to say I was first amazed, shocked and then impressed. Partly because I had thought of something very similar myself and secondly that someone had beaten me to the punch. I must however say that based on what I have read and research so far, this is a fantastic opportunity. You can download the free 25 page report by click the following link and judge for yourself, I will be interested to have your comments ($100,000 “Net” a day – how to really make money on the internet).

I have always believed that the internet is truly the way to make real money. Like back in the 1800’s you needed to be a merchant, the 1900’s you needed to be an industrialist now the 2000’s you need to be an Internet Business. Lets be frank it is probably the cheapest way to start a business, no wonder there are more internet millionaires than any other industry. Granted for every successful Internet Entrepreneur there is probably 100 failed ones, but I believe this has got to do with the normal business and life success principles, some people will make it and some won’t, the difference with the people that made it is they never gave up. Regardless of how many times things went wrong or they “failed” they never gave up, because those that do, never realised how close they were to succeeding.

So my wealth journey continues, I have had a number of ventures that have been very slow to pick up, and to be honest I have been close to giving up, but alas, I am a fighter and no matter what I will be a billionaire by 2020. To get that free 25 page report if you have not already done so, click the following link (($100,000 “Net” a day – how to really make money on the internet).

Today marked the beginning for the 2.5% VAT rate cut in the UK, but wait for it, the rate cut is temporary, and will only last till 31st December 2009! I mean come on Mr. Darling, surely you have to have some common sense. Will the rate cut really stimulate the economy? In my personal opinion definitely NOT! Lets put this into perspective, according to the Chancellor, the 2.5% cut will help businesses save when making purchases and consumers to buy more (increase spending). Fantastic on the face of things, but lets use some very simple LOGIC to demonstrate the flaw in this economic stimulation policy.

By reducing the VAT rate to 15% from Monday, 1st December 2008, the government has basically said for every £1.00 we spend, we will “save” £2.50! Great, not a bad “savings” in the scheme of things, but is it really a saving? From a businesses perspective this is not the case. I spoke with several business owners about this matter and read many interesting articles and blogs relating to this. Most interesting was this article on the Computer Weekly website (VAT rate cut will cause system problems, warns analyst). Personally this is very logical, and the two points below illustrate this.

Firstly, here is the MAJOR FLAW with this rate cut (I am sure many of you spotted it already). If you read the full details on the HMRC website (Pre-Budget Report 2008 – VAT Rate Changes), the fourth paragraph says it all. The 15% rate cut will only remain till the 31st December 2009, from 1st January it will revert back up to 17.5%! Surely this has got to be the biggest mistake and shambolic economic “stimulus” strategy / policy ever. I am no economist but it is very clear that the amount of money businesses will “save” from the rate cut has a huge potential to be negated on the simple fact of how much it will cost to change their computer systems, financial management software, tills, price tags etc just to factor in the VAT rate cut “saving”, only to have to put it all back up again in just over a years time! I mean come on they could have thought this through better and I am sure the had a team of economic analysts to refer to.

Secondly, the limited time to change over will be even more costly. The Pre-Budget Report was announced on the 24th November 2008, and the rate reduction is to take place from the 1st December 2008. That gave companies only 6 days to change things over. I haven’t even bothered calling my Accountant, I am sure he has been inundated with phone calls with some of his other clients asking what they should do and how they should do it! Plenty of consultants are about to make a lot of money of this, less 2.5% of course (If they are VAT registered). Not that I am a big US economic policy fan (the Credit Crunch started there as a result of their actions), but a VAT rate cut would have been simpler to implement in the US because VAT is calculated at POS (Point of Sale) in most States. In the UK VAT is already factored into most pricing consumers are presented with, thereby making it a manual process to change labels, tags, etc.

This all seems like the whole 2K issue all over again, but at least companies had a few years to devise strategies and implement the change over, here we had 6 days (2 more days at the time of posting this blog) to implement something that is only going to be valid for 1 year 1 month! The HMRC released a guide on the 24th November 2008 titled VAT – CHANGE IN THE STANDARD RATE, which effectively confirms my comments regarding how shambolic this is going to be. The Guide is only 44 pages long which is fine and easy to read, but going through it you instantly realise the ramifications of all this.

Boy it has been too long since I last blogged. Partly laziness and partly just being sheer busy building up my companies. I am delighted to note one of my companies has officially launched and so far so good. I have issued my first invoice so only £999,999,800 to go till I reach £1 billion. Of course this is gross and does not start to factor in overhead costs etc but then is when it gets tricky. The beauty with this business venture is it is service oriented so the overhead costs are very very small, I would say if I actually broke it down it would be at least 70% pure profit.

I have been networking a lot, these past couple of weeks, with some fantastic results. The truth is I had always believed in the power of the network, I think I used to do it more informally than I am doing it now. I have really formalised it, i.e. identifying which events to attend, dishing out the business cards, following up with a “it was great to meet you at such and such an event” email, sending an invitationt to be part of my LinkedIn network, I tell that is a full time job in its own rights. Networking is trully powerful, I love meeting new people, finding out about them, sharing about me, laughing at what you have in common and hopefully going on to build lasting friendships and rewarding business relationships for all involved.

So the journey continues, I will be trying to blog at least once a week, I think my attempt at trying to blog every single day was a bit ambitious, but it can’t be helped I am a go getter.

So until we read again,

I wish you wealth, good health, peace and happiness

abillionaire

Yesterday I went to the worst party I have ever been to in while. That is partly the reason why I didn’t get the chance to blog but it also made me realise that there are some boring people out there in this world!

I have been feeling a little lethargic these last couple of days, the task at hand is really sinking in and you always want to feel like you are making progress. It is only natural I believe then to feel down and doubt yourself sometimes. This is where “You motivate you” comes into play. The truth is, you can read many an inspirational book, have people talk you up as much as possible, but its really down to you. Life is an individual sport and whilst you may have many team players it is really down to you to achieve what you want to achieve in life. The building of my empire is something that is hugely important to me, how I am going to build it is starting to take shape, however I know it is not going to be easy and days like these will come around.

I keep feeling like I am nearly there, but I just need that last little push to cross me over. Right now something that would be very uplifting is if I managed to secure the first round of funding for my business. I realise to do that I need to have a rock solid business plan and I think that is where I am struggling and what is getting me down. I have read a few articles about this and it says entrepreneurs are very focused on the idea but forget to concentrate on the plan or rather less interested to committing the idea to paper which is crucial if you want to have that funding. So I have made a pact with myself that I am going to get this business plan done by the end of the week so I can cross over and take things to the next level.

I motivate me and I am my biggest asset.

I wish you wealth, good health, peace and happiness

abillionaire

Wow! That was just one of those statements that blew me away. It is worth reading again – “Success comes to those who find businesses with great economics and not necessarily great inventions or advances to mankind.”. Now when I started this blog, my thing was really about using innovation to make me rich. I also knew that along this journey to great wealth through innovation I was going to be great lessons, this is one of them. I came across it today whilst doing some research on polishing up my Business Plan and it really stuck.

Lets dissect this statement for a moment. The Success  part of this statement demonstrates that is the primary objective. Success in business simply means more profit period. Of course there are other “sub-success” e.g. customer satisfaction, but the main purpose behind running a business is profit, any other reason then you need to register as a charity. Success in innovation on the other hand refers to both radical and incremental changes in thinking, in things, in processes or in services (Mckeown, 2008 ) – the goal of innovation is positive change, to make someone or something better. 

The next part of the statement is the one that really kicked me in the nuts, its ones of those simple yet brutal statements. Some initial research showed that they have been many great innovations out, some still around today, but these innovations are the worst businesses ever. A good example is the airline industry. I read a report that stated that the cumulative earnings of all airlines since Wilber Wright flew that first plane are less than zero, basically airline losses have been greater than their profits.

So the lesson learnt here is quite simple, as innovators even though we may have fantastic inventions we need to ensure the the business i.e. economics side of things is taken care of. I am sure people in the UK watched the final of The Apprentice last night, and forget who won and the controversy behind it for a moment and lets look at the task they were given. Alex and Helene came up with a brilliant product in my eyes (even though it was actually the designer who came up with it, but theres the point), the product was very practical, heck I would but it. But when the economics were thrown in the industry experts confirmed that production of the bottle would noy be viable and as opposed to the RRP of £29.99 a bottle like that would have cost three if not four times that. So its now not only all about the innovation folks its about the economics of these things. I am glad I started looking for an accountant now.

I wish you wealth, good health, peace and happiness

abillionaire.

 

Following on from my post two days ago [Cash flow, Financial Forecast, NPV, CAPM, Risk Analysis %$£* I just want to run a business! – 10th June 2008], I had a few meetings with some Accountants today. As my Innovation and Business Enterprise company is a start-up I thought it best to get an accountant on board at a very early stage. Every business needs a good professional team behind them to help support the business. My way of choosing a firm I think is reasonably sensible, meet with four firms and make a decision as to who I think I can work best with and who could be beneficial to realising the vision.

You see in my opinion a lot of business people forget this, an accountant isn’t just the person who prepares your annual accounts every year and keeps the tax man or woman off your back, but they are really an integral part of your business from an organisational perspective. And if you are a small business, you need to ensure you pick the right one more than ever. Before you start looking make sure you have a selection, I like the number four, so I chose 4 different firms, 2 I researched locally, 1 I got as a referral and the other, well I saw their signage and just walked into their office (nothing like some off the street potential business right). I also made sure they were all local, this is a personal thing for me as I want to feel like I am giving business to the local community. I have a simple and logical five point check list for accountant selection (Please note this is a list based on my opinion please consult professional advice before you make a decision abillionaire will not be held responsible for any losses – lol- there I go again with my “health warnings”):

1. Rule no. 1 when picking an accountant – make sure they have some sort of track record, but are not the sort of firm that have remained stagnant over time. You want a dynamic proactive firm.
2. Leading on from these dynamic and proactive characteristics, you need a firm that is really on the ball. Tax & Company Laws change very regularly, I am talking annually in some cases, so you need a firm that is grasping this information quick enough and relaying it to you in a manner you understand.
3. Keep it professional boys and girls. Sleeping with your accountant can be detrimental to your business. Remember the old rule “never mix business with pleasure”!
4. Trust. Big big big rule! You have to trust your accountant, they have the power to get the tax man or woman to investigate you and the power to make you bankrupt.
5. Make sure your accountant is well connected and creative (well from a financial perspective). Remember your network = your net worth, we all know that. So a well networked accountant, who looks after other high net worth individuals could possibly mean investors or clients for your business through referral. And the creativity part is simple, there is a reason multi millionaires, billionaires and corporations pay less tax in relation to what they actually earn, its called creative financing / accounting. Nothing illegal about it by the way.
6. The last sentence above is very very important. I cannot stress this enough, never ever go with a dodgy accountant, and if you do for whatever reason chose an accountant that turns out to be dodgy or unethical, severe ties with them as quick as possible and ensure there is a huge gulf between you. Because sooner or later he or she will get caught and when he or she does that tax man or woman will start investigating every single one of their clients, and that includes you.

So we got the accountants blog post done and dusted. Tomorrow, my blog will be one week old, so happy birthday to me.

I still haven’t chosen an accountant yet by the way, now I am going to digest everything they have said and let them stew for bit, also it will be interesting if any of them try and follow up with you, that is always a sign that they want ou business. But then again accountants are accountants not sales people, but the truth is they are still in business and every business needs to be able to sell itself!

I wish you wealth, good health, peace and happiness.

abillionaire

I couldn’t resist I just had to jump on the bandwagon and have a blog post about the Blackberry vs iPhone debate, especially after the news of the iPhone 3G release news. I am however, going to look at it from a business side of things, because I am all about the business.

Firstly let me pass my condolences to Nokia, Motorola (Goodbye Moto), Samsung, LG & Siemens and the rest of the mobile phone handset “original” manufacturers. You have just experienced a wonderful lesson in Disruptive Intellectual Property 101 and Product Life Cycle for Dummies. I can remember when I had my first “brick mobile phone”, it was actually my moms, but I used it like is was mine, I was only 15 at the time. Then when I turned 18 I got my own mobile (Yep at that time you really had to be at least 16 to have your own mobile phone, now even 10 year olds have mobiles). Back to my Disruptive Intellectual Property and Product Life Cycle lesson – you see all these manufacturers thought they had conquered the world, little did they know they were really just the opening act.

When Blackberry stepped on the scene a good few years ago things got a little interesting. Originally a device for the Wall Street & City (London term for Investment Bankers) boys & girls, they really become popular with them because companies soon realised that they increased productivity from their employees, they started dishing them out as part of your remuneration package. You can picture the scenario right, Bankers / Executives on the golf course entertaining and the office needing you to proof some figures, presto, your pocket vibrated or you heard that bleep and there you had it, CAPM.xls. Quick glance the click confirmation to your PA that you are happy with the figures and you just made your company another £10 million.

Then pop culture took over and everyone had to have a Blackberry from Paris Hilton to Prince Harry. Terms like “crackberry” were coined just to indicate how addictive the device is (I am testament to that, I swear I need therapy). Then just like the PC vs Mac wars, Apple thought they would step into the mobile phone market, and with much hype, catchy advertising and those classic Steve Jobs presentations we saw the birth of the iPhone.

The features were amazing and Apple fanatics (which I am not, by the way) formed an orderly queue (some even 24 hours before) to get their hands on one. There were great reviews of the device and while Nokia, Motorola (Goodbye Moto) and the rest were K.O’d, RIM, who make Blackberry’s, were only knocked against the ropes. They regained their momentum with updated model designs, the good ol’ trackerball navigation, media player, camera and a host of other applications (Visit Handago for more information). Then Apple came through and connected with a left hook (ouch!!!), with the news of the iPhone 3G.

Lets exam the The Business Principles here folks for our dearly departed “original manufacturers”:

No. 1 – This one is simple, the “original” mobile device manufacturers dropped the ball, they should have seen the Blackberry & iPhones coming.

No. 2 – You have to innovate to keep things viable in business, basic Product Life Cycle math.

No. 3 – If you are not first to market you can still come and blow the market away with your product -Congratulations Steve Jobs & Apple.

No. 4 – Oh, lets not forget number 4, this is the most important one (Bill Gates and Microsoft pioneered this one) – Get version one out as soon as possible (bugs, warts and all), then release a “super duper” version two shortly thereafter and people will throw out their current version and “upgrade”. Just Brilliant looks like your Profit & Loss account is showing more profit than loss now 😉

So folks there are a lot of business principles to be learnt from the mobile phone device industry and some we should take on board regardless of our business. As I grow my empire and become a billionaire, these are lessons I will truly take on board, because in business you have to have the EDGE.

I wish you wealth, good health, peace and happiness

abillionaire