I just had my best course launch EVER, and with a much, much smaller audience than I have on this site.

About a month ago, I had a 4-day launch sale for a new course called POD Niche Site Success.

In the first 12 hours, I generated $5,000 profit, which is more than I did for the entire launch of my first course with this site.

The reason why I’m focusing on the initial $5,000 I made in the first 12 hours of launch is I remember that was my goal for my first 2Create course launch, and I didn’t even come close to that.

Let me put this all into perspective with some numbers…

When I launched my first course on this site in 2014, my list had around 30,000 subscribers.

That may sound like a lot, but many of these people on my list were not even engaged anymore and were either not opening my emails or weren’t receiving them (junk/spam filters).

When I launched my latest course for Passive Shirt Profits, my list was at 1400. The difference is this list was much newer/fresher and the audience was more engaged AND niched down.

In other words, most people on the list wanted to learn the same things.

There’s always so much emphasis on “growing a list”, but what’s the point if the people on the list want a dozen different things?

That was always a challenge with this site because I covered so many different topics over the years.

By the time I was ready to sell a course in 2014, I had attracted an audience that wanted to learn everything from WordPress, starting a business, YouTube to affiliate marketing. I also never took advantage of segmenting my list like I should have.

So what else went wrong with my first course launch on this site?

I Was Low-Balling My Products

I thought that offering a very low, affordable product with tons of content would actually make MORE people buy, but I actually think it hurt in some ways.

Not only does it make you LESS motivated to market it (too little profit), but it attracts a lot of people who never even open the course because they didn’t invest a lot.

Super low prices can also send a message of low quality.

I know because some of you flat out told me that.

One subscriber almost didn’t sign up because he assumed it was lacking value due to the very low price.

When he finally did sign up, he was blown away by the amount of content for such a low price.

To this day, I still struggle with what to charge for my courses, but I DO know that it’s NEVER a good idea to sell super low.

It’s better to pack the product with value and charge what it’s worth.

I Didn’t Pay Attention To What People REALLY Needed

This was even more problematic than me low-balling my prices.

I believe this is where most first-time course creators stumble (in addition to not having an eager-to-buy audience.)

Had I really nailed this part with my first 2create courses, my conversions and engagement would have been much better, even at lower prices.

As newbie course creators, we have a tendency to focus on what WE want to sell instead of listening to what people in our audience REALLY need and want.

In 2014 (my first course launch on this site), not many people were asking me to create an affiliate marketing course. The hype for affiliate marketing had cooled off by then, at least for my audience.

But I chose that topic because that’s where I had made most of money, and was still making the majority of my income at that time. I didn’t know what else to do.

And why launch a Photoshop course in addition to the affiliate course? That didn’t even make sense for THIS audience, but it was what I wanted to teach. SMH

Looking back…. it was a such a strange combo of courses to launch to this particular audience.

Again, I was making it about ME and what I wanted to teach. I had learned how to use Photoshop to create images for my sites.

However, learning the program wasn’t really in demand for THIS audience — especially with free products like Canva and Picmonkey on the rise.

I had this big ole’ audience, but didn’t really take the time to utilize it to RESEARCH and ASK what people wanted from me at that current time.

Given the state of my business and the evolving Internet Marketing space in 2014, it would have made more sense to create a course on building authority and credibility for a website.

Looking back at my biz, those are two, foundational things that have served me VERY well amidst the changing times, numerous websites and online evolution. It’s been the BACKBONE of my business, hands down. It’s also something any new website owner or influencer needs, especially when trying to sell products.

Nevertheless, I would have ASKED people on this list what they wanted instead of just hoping people would want to learn what I wanted to teach.

Another disadvantage of not really delivering content people NEED is I never received many questions, comments or interaction on my 2create courses.

Not to mention nearly half of the people who signed up for my courses never even opened them.

I believe a lot of people bought them because they were cheap, but it wasn’t really content they needed or wanted.

So you might say, “So what if half of them didn’t open the course! You still got your money, right?”

Wrong perspective!

If people aren’t even taking the course, they aren’t interacting with you or your content. Interaction is important because it generates feedback on what to improve and clarify.

I learned from my Merch By Amazon course (no longer available) that having specific questions from students helps me learn where the course is lacking and what I need to improve on.

As a result of the many questions, I kept adding to it and improving the course. Consequently, I began hearing success stories from my students on a more regular basis.

When my students get results, that allows me to add testimonials to the landing page, which in turn helps me sell more courses in the long run.

It’s a win for my students and a win for me!

When I added testimonial screenshots from my students in my private group, the sign-up rate tripled for my Merch course.

I Created Buzz For The Course

Because I did a better job of getting in touch with what my potential students struggled with, it gave me a certain confidence with this course that I hadn’t had with previous launches.

As a result, I was more aggressive with promotion.

Before launch, I used my podcast, YouTube, and my list to remind people what was coming.

I also made sure people knew that there will be a limited-time launch discount only, and that I don’t frequently discount my courses.

In the past, I never built much of a buzz before launch. I may mention it in passing on a blog post, but didn’t do a lot of direct marketing prior to launch.

I believe that also made a HUGE difference.

I Was More Strategic About What I Shared for Free

I remember when I thought about launching my first course for this site.

I was so intimidated by the process because I had already shared so much here and on YouTube.

Not that you can’t include info you already have for free, but I always wanted my courses to have so much more valuable than the free content.

That was more difficult to do with 2 Create because of how much free information I already had online AND I waited so long before creating my first product.

You also have to remember, I had a different income model with this site. I was heavily reliant on affiliate marketing and AdSense, so my strategy was to give away tons of free content in exchange for ad / affiliate revenue.

However, when you’re planning to sell courses, your strategy has to change and that was a big adjustment for me.

I didn’t have that much of an issue with PSP because I knew I was creating that site to sell courses, and I didn’t wait years before I launched a product.

Finding The Right Price/Value Balance

I have learned that you should not low-ball your products, but trying to find the happy medium between what it’s worth and making it affordable has been difficult for me.

Nevertheless, it always bothered me when people told me I should charge soooooo much more. Why did that make me so uncomfortable? I wasn’t really sure why until this recent launch.

Just because someone has a large presence on YouTube or social media, doesn’t mean they know how to create products that are worth thousands of dollars.

One thing I KNEW about my courses is I had to improve upon helping people get more RESULTS.

Granted, no course is going to help every single person, but I always wanted to challenge myself in that area. I knew I needed to improve, and I made that my personal mission for my latest course.

I always got “great course” feedback on my courses, but not enough “I’m making money because of your course” kind of feedback until the latter editions of my Merch By Amazon course.

Again, because I got a lot of feedback from students, I continued to add/update the course to reflect any questions/feedback I received.

That was HUGE for me as a course creator. We cannot improve without feedback, and I rarely got constructive feedback on my 2create courses.

Again, that’s a result of the low engagement, and I take FULL responsibility for that.

Within two weeks of launching my latest POD Niche Site Success course I had 4 different people tell me they started making money right away, and a couple of them posted in my private, student group.

Another testimonial came in that same day!

I have blocked their names/faces by request because this is a private, student-only Facebook group.

Yes, within two weeks of launch I’m hearing about success! I’ve never, ever gotten that kind of feedback so quickly.

So with regards to price, I wasn’t all that keen on raising them too much until I got better with helping people GET RESULTS.

As far as the pricing strategy goes, I have yet to test the limited-time enrollment.

I know people are making oodles of money doing this. For some reason, I’m not ready for that just yet. Maybe I’ll test that this year.

The Indirect, Less Obvious Value of YouTube

People always measure one’s success on YouTube by their subscriber numbers.

You know how I feel about the hang up on vanity metrics. [rolls eyes]

Subscribers don’t mean as much if you aren’t using them to help your bottom line, and this time I did a better job of that.

Not just by promoting the upcoming course in my videos, but the comment section was immensely valuable to my course creation process!

I can now say that YouTube was single-handedly my best resource in 2019 when it came to discovering what people in my PSP audience TRULY value.

It all started with my 14-day challenge back in January to get the video momentum going.

I uploaded more videos in 2019 than I have in a very long time, and they were mostly focused on Print on Demand (earning royalties from T-shirt designs).

I hadn’t been doing many videos on the T-shirt biz, so I was out of touch with what people wanted and needed in that space.

I used YouTube to help attract more people to my channel that would be interested in the T-shirt content.

I debated on whether or not I should start another channel. I’m glad I didn’t. Even though the majority of my subscribers subbed for different content and my channel viewing engagement is pretty low, I decided to use the same channel because the newer content is still about earning online.

As a result of uploading more videos, I was rewarded with 10,000 more subscribers this year and finally received the 100K Silver Play Button plaque from YouTube!

Don’t get me wrong. I am proud of that milestone, but what good are new subscribers if you aren’t using them to help your bottom line?

I’ve been on YouTube since 2007, and this was the first time I effectively used my videos to help me grow my product income.

Not just by promoting my upcoming course in the videos, but actually soaking up the comments and using them for inspiration for what to include in a course.

YouTube comments can be one of the best research tools for figuring out what to sell. I took notes on the most common issues with regards to print on demand and used those as a blueprint for my latest course.

It’s a shame people put so much emphasis on subscribers because there’s so many other indirect benefits of being on YouTube.

I wish the mentality of “followers automatically equals success” would die, but I know it never will.

So What Took Me So Long?

I was having brunch with one of my good friends and was telling her about the recent launch. I mentioned how I’ve struggled with selling over the years.

Her response was…

“Still?”

As if to say, “You’ve been out here all this time and you still struggle with that?”

The majority of the money I’ve made online has not been because of selling products to people directly.

It was passive income from ads, YouTube partner income, reselling domains and affiliate links. In fact, I still have some passive income streams that I created over 15 years ago.

So when it came time to actually sell my first course in 2014, I realized I had a lot to learn.

Just because I had a big audience that likes my videos and content, didn’t mean I knew exactly what or how to sell to them.

Passive Shirt Profits has taught me so much and reinforced things I already knew but never really implemented myself…

• It’s not the size of the list but how targeted the audience is.

• People value ACTIONABLE steps with SPECIFIC examples in a course — not just a conglomeration of information crammed into one course.
  
• It makes a huge difference when you build buzz on multiple platforms before launch.
  
• Your popularity shouldn’t be the only determining factor when it comes to pricing products. You have to consider the RESULTS the product yields as well.

As far as pricing goes, a lot of you all warned me about low-balling, but sometimes we have to make the mistake and learn things the hard way.

And instead of just focusing on how much you can charge or earn, put as much emphasis on making sure your course generates RESULTS.

Passive Shirt Profits has never gotten close to the traffic or income this site has received.

Not. Even. Close.

But my products/courses have converted far better than any site I’ve ever created because I’m learning to be more results-oriented and my audience is more targeted.

This course launch meant a lot more than the first Passive Shirt Profits course launch in 2017.

It’s hard to know for sure, but I would imagine a lot of those initial customers came from this site because I hadn’t really built much of an audience for the T-shirt space in 2017.

However, this launch was different.

I put 2create on hold last year and directed all my energy and content to the T-shirt space. So the buzz I generated for this recent launch more than likely came from YouTube uploads and podcast content I created in 2019.

It goes to show, that learning to sell online is a process, and don’t expect it to come easy just because you have a large following of people who admire you.

I’ve had to rebuild over the years because a lot of 2create followers are no longer engaged.

Also, earning passively from ads and affiliate links is much, much different than selling a product.

You have to learn how to create products people actually want, need and then you have to generate RESULTS for your customers.

And guess what?

I’m STILL learning to this day!

So the journey continues. Looking forward to growing and helping even more people in 2020!

Thanks, everyone for your support and hanging with me even when I haven’t had much to share here.

I hope you have a healthy and prosperous 2020!

Can you believe it’s been a YEAR since my last blog update?

I have no idea how many of you will even read this, so I’ll just start out by saying helloooooooo to anyone reading this post.

…..all three of you! LOL!!

Before I jump in, let me touch on some personal things. Many of you have continued to reach out and ask about my dad since I’ve been gone. I appreciate you for that.

Not only is my dad doing well, but he’s back to traveling the world!

I took my family to Jamaica earlier this year to celebrate family and good health. A few months later, my parents went to Australia, and my mom joked that my dad walked her all over the continent.

What a blessing considering he couldn’t walk at all for nearly 3 months in 2018. And if you saw him walk, you’d never know he broke both of his ankles when he passed out. There’s no visible limp whatsoever!

Biz Updates

If you had told me 3 years ago that I would be making a good portion of my income from my own digital art, I would have laughed!

It all started with the Merch By Amazon program.

I’ve earned nearly $150,000 in royalties selling digital art on Amazon alone. That doesn’t include any additional royalties from other sites and niche shops on Spreadshirt, TeePublic, Etsy, RedBubble and more.

I have a handful of shops on different niches, and a few with some random topics. My niche shops always, always outperform the random ones.

In Summer, 2018, I realized Merch By Amazon (MBA) was getting more competitive, and I knew that the glory days would be coming to an end sooner than later.

I wanted to diversify and focus on one niche.

So instead of doing all this random keyword stuff, I took a keyword/niche that I had discovered on Amazon the previous year and began building a shop for that audience.

It’s not a niche I am all that passionate about, but the low demand really got my attention. Plus, I was already selling in this space on Amazon. So I figured I could dominate this market by increasing my volume of designs.

I opened up a free RedBubble shop, and it was super slow going in the first few months. I’m talking about $5 monthly earnings. Yikes!

Slowly but surely, things began to pick up. I now have sales everyday.

I chose RedBubble because I didn’t have a following in this niche, and I knew they already had a lot of organic traffic. Plus, they offer tons of products and are constantly adding them.

In September of this year, I hit my first $3,000 month with this brand alone.

It’s important to note that $3,000 in one month is not just coming from shop sales. I began licensing certain designs to people who want to print and sell them on their local shops.

This was never the plan, but people kept reaching out to me and asking about licensing and custom work.

I didn’t want other people selling the same designs I was selling, so I decline some requests. However, if someone needs something completely different then I will create the image and charge a licensing fee. The price depends on how they plan to use it.

I setup a simple landing page on my domain where people can order a license with PayPal. So that added another income stream I wasn’t expecting.

I was very lucky that I found a niche that was completely underserved from an ecommerce standpoint. These people are elated that someone is actually devoting unique designs and a single shop to their niche. That has been key!

If you want to learn more about exactly how I chose the keyword and built the ecommerce brand from scratch, you can read the story over on Passive Shirt Profits. I wrote it in June, just after my first $2,000 month.

Why I Abandoned This Blog… Again.

My overall goal was to come back here from time to time and share website marketing lessons that I’ve gained from running Passive Shirt Profits.

But to be brutally honest, I’m making more money from my own art than I am teaching what I’m doing. So there hasn’t been all that much to share to this audience with regards to marketing.

After all, most of you signed up because you want to make money from a website, but I’m actually doing a lot WITHOUT a website believe it or not.

Now, I did setup a site to promote the shop, but it’s really just a landing page. I have a couple of pages and the license fee order form.

What’s Next?

As I discussed in a recent video, I’ve spent the better part of the last two years improving my software knowledge (Illustrator, especially.)

Now it’s time to go back to my roots of website building and marketing — especially now that I’m focusing on a single brand.

In 2020, I’m going to put more energy into actually building the site up so it can act as another way to drive traffic to the shop. In other words, it’s time to build some more link juice!

Wow….link juice! I just realized I haven’t used THAT phrase in a long time!

I was pleased to see that one of my pages is now ranked 4th on Google for its desired keyword on such a small site. Good ole’ Google! I have to say, it does still let you play in the long-tail keyword game.

Long gone are the days where you could pick a fairly competitive keyword and start ranking a site quickly. I plan on using long tail keywords as the focus of the content to drive additional traffic.

And when I say long-tail, I mean LOOOOONG tail. The keyword I’m ranking for is about 6 keywords long. Nevertheless, it’s still used according to the Keywords Everywhere Chrome extension.

So the majority of the sales are coming from free, organic traffic on RedBubble, but I want that to change. You KNOW how much I hate relying on one source of traffic.

That’s one of the reasons I haven’t shared the niche. I’m very protective of it, and I’ve had to deal with enough theft of my ideas WITHOUT even using my name on this brand and sharing it. So I don’t even want to think about the copycats that would surface if I revealed it.

Maybe once I have a steady traffic source that is not relying so much on free traffic, I can start sharing more. That would also help with teaching because people can actually SEE what I’m doing.

I did branch out and start using Pinterest last year to promote my shop designs. So that has helped me diversify traffic a bit.

I love Pinterest because it can bring so much traffic for a long period of time. You don’t get that same traction with Instagram or Twitter.

I even have proof that Pinterest actually brings sales to my shop, thanks to Google Analytics.

Let me tell you. If you have an ecommerce shop and you are NOT using Pinterest, you are really, really missing out.

Pinterest is actually not a social media site. It’s a search engine that tons of people use now, and the traffic does convert!

I have been a Pinterest fan since it launched in 2011, but I was never able to track sales. Well, thanks to RedBubble, I can. It’s good to see that it actually does convert.

I know many of the gurus have said that it does, but I needed to see for myself!

A Parallel Universe

Probably one of the most fascinating things about running Passive Shirt Profits is the discovery of the parallel problems between both audiences.

When I think back to the many years of running this website and my YouTube channel, the issue people always had was aligning what they want to sell with what people actually want to buy.

Sometimes they are not the same, and you have to adjust if you notice the two are not lining up.

I’ve had people come to me with these enormous, complex website visions, yet the audience hasn’t been clearly defined. So they are never able to execute because the idea doesn’t really make sense with what is actually in demand.

When people set out to make money online (no matter the method), they often have tunnel vision with regards to their idea, and it can be very difficult to redirect it.

Just because you have an idea for a website or a T-shirt, doesn’t mean there is an audience that is receptive to the idea, OR maybe you aren’t connecting with people because of the way you are delivering it.

So instead of trying to find an audience that will accept or understand your idea, you need to actually research what the audience wants FIRST.

When I think back to the success I’ve had on this website, YouTube and with selling shirts, it has LESS to do with my technical skills of web or T-shirt design. I’ll be the first to admit, I don’t have a lot of natural design talent.

It’s really more about understanding the audience I’m talking to and connecting to them in some way with my content.

That could be done by communicating via a blog post, YouTube video OR on a T-shirt. It doesn’t matter what you sell, you have to KNOW and be able to speak to your audience. But you can’t do that unless you truly know what they want and need.

It’s very tempting to stay married to your idea, T-shirt design or website direction, but it always needs to align with what is actually in demand.

I see so many people trying to force their ideas on an audience that hasn’t been validated yet, and they do the same thing with T-shirts.

One of my YouTube subscribers wanted me to look at his Etsy shop because he couldn’t understand why no one was buying. He told me that he doesn’t like doing research. He prefers to design what he likes.

Welp! There’s the problem right there!

Selling a product, no matter the arena, is not always about what YOU want. It’s more about what a defined audience wants and how well you can deliver it.

That’s the main lesson I wanted to bring back here. It doesn’t matter if you plan to create a website, design a T-shirt or sell a weight loss product on YouTube.

If you haven’t taken the time to really understand that audience so you can connect with their needs, pain points and desires, it won’t matter how “great” the idea is.

It’s also why it’s never a good idea for anyone to tell you what niche to go into. So much of that will depend on what you have to offer the audience.

Having websites in two very different spaces really highlighted how many people struggle with that all-important step of defining WHO they are going to reach and how they are going to connect with them.

Market / niche research is one of the most boring parts of earning online, but it cannot be skipped no matter how you plan to earn.

Anywho, just wanted to check in and say hello! Drop me a line and let me know what you’re up to! Hope 2019 has treated you well!

Heeeeey everyone! Long time no “see!”

I wanted to update you all on some things since it’s been a while since I’ve posted.

The number one email I’ve received in the last few months has been regarding my 2Create courses. You may have noticed that most of them have been set to “private.”

After my dad got sick in March, I knew I wasn’t going to have time to focus on supporting students for two websites. PSP was my main focus, and I also have a private student group to support.

So I decided to set the 2Create courses to “private” to prevent new students from enrolling.

Then once things returned to normal in my personal life, I had to be honest with myself.

I wasn’t doing much with website building or marketing, other than passively using my podcast to promote PSP courses.

I’m making waaaaay more money selling my T-shirt designs than I am with the actual courses that teach what I’m doing. 

I’ve had about 500 students enroll in my PSP courses. While that’s not bad, it could have been so much better if I did more marketing.

I’ve never been comfortable or efficient with marketing my products. It intimidates me. That’s one business hump I’ve never been able to get over.

I admire people who are diligent with tracking email campaigns and conversions. It all just makes my head spin.

I’d rather make a T-shirt.

Why The T-Shirt Biz is So Rewarding to Me

For a long time, affiliate marketing and AdSense were my favorite and most rewarding ways to earn online.

However, POD now holds that top spot.

I don’t come from a design background so I’ve had to learn a lot.

When I worked as an HTML Analyst for American Airlines over 10 years ago, my team lead forced us to use Photoshop, but the company provided us ZERO training.

I remember staring at the blank Photoshop interface wondering what the heck I was supposed to do with all those tools and buttons as they stared back at me.

I never actually learned much about Photoshop until I quit my full-time job in 2006 to work on this site.

Fast forward 12 years later, I’m now using Photoshop and Illustrator to create some very detailed art that I never thought I would be able to do.

To see how far I’ve come, and then to have people buy my designs by the thousands, is incredibly rewarding and slightly addictive.

It also goes to show anyone can do this regardless of your design background.

I have one T-shirt that has netted over $20,000 in royalties.  Yes, from ONE T-shirt design!

Think Before You Leap

With all the income potential, print on Demand is not for everyone. Just like anything else, don’t get into this just because you are in desperate need of money.

You need the desire to learn the POD business and even something about software if you want to scale your income.

And for long-term success, you should be thinking of building a brand instead of relying on passive traffic and income like I’ve been.

Even if you’re a talented designer, you will quickly learn that’s just the beginning. You also have to understand keywords and find niches to design for.

It’s getting very competitive, so make sure you jump in for the right reasons.

If I’m honest, I was drawn to this venture for the money, but I’ve STAYED because of my love for the work.

When my dad was sick, I was super stressed. I found the creation process to be therapeutic.

A lot of my success has come because of creative ideas that just haven’t been done, and the creative work is what makes this fun for me.

On the flip side, you also have to be prepared for theft. That’s been the biggest disappointment of this whole experience. It’s why I use an alias for my POD accounts, and don’t share much of my work.

As a result of Amazon and other PODs not protecting our work with a wrinkle or watermark, my images have been stolen and re-uploaded to numerous sites.

Things have gotten a little better since using watermarks, wrinkles, etc., but you’re never going to be able to fully protect your work. As long as it’s online, someone will find a way to grab it if they want it.

I Enrolled in An Art Class

One of my goals for POD is to scan hand-drawn work. Then I could “ink it” (color it) after importing it into Illustrator, but I had to learn to draw first. LOL

Up until now, most of my designs have been created through shapes in software. Believe me. You can do a lot with this. That’s what I teach in my PSP Photoshop course.

Now I’m doing this more with Illustrator as I improve.

However, I wanted to learn how to draw free hand. So I enrolled in an art class.

We’re learning some basic drawing principles and how to shade using graphite, charcoal, and colored pencils.

Here are some cherries I drew with colored pencils. I was pretty proud of this because I was struggling with shading earlier in the semester.

I’m too embarrassed to show my first shading attempt. It was absolutely awful. LOL

So as you can see, I am now knee-deep in learning about drawing and T-shirt design. It has been a nice change of pace.

That’s All For Now

Anywho, I know most of you did not subscribe for all this print on demand stuff.

That’s why I haven’t been blogging much. I didn’t have anything noteworthy to share in this space. However, I wanted to update you on why I took down my 2Create courses since many have asked.

Those who have enrolled can still access them, but I have no plans to enable them for new students any time soon.

I DO plan to make updates for the existing students, however.

By the way, my dad is doing great!

He is walking again, and his ankles are doing well considering how severely he injured them.

Other than some initial stiffness when he first stands up, he’s walking well now! We feel so blessed and lucky he came through all that.

Thanks to all who reached out to inquire about his health. I really appreciate it!

Hope you’re doing well! Drop me a line below and let me know what’s up with you!

Whew!

Life took an unexpected turn in early March, and my focus went from being a full-time entrepreneur to a full-time caretaker.

My dad, who has lived a life with near perfect health, got very sick, very quickly.

He went from being in perfect health on a Friday, March 2nd, to being near death the following Tuesday evening, thanks to a severe kidney infection.

He thought he had the flu. Unfortunately, it was much worse than that.

The infection got into his bloodstream and his body went into septic shock, and every single organ began shutting down one by one.

Before he knew he had the infection, he got dizzy and fell in the bathroom and broke BOTH of his ankles.

Yes… both!

So he cannot put any weight on either leg and is in a wheelchair.

He’s been this way for nearly two months because he had to get clearance for ankle surgery by several different doctors.

As you can imagine, for a man who was very active, this is driving him nuts having to sit all day and be so dependent on family.

He was finally approved for surgery this Wednesday. So hopefully the therapy will begin a few weeks after that and he can get back to walking.

Nevertheless, it all could have been so much worse. I’m just so grateful he is alive and his health is good!

Thank Goodness For The Biz!

In the meantime, I feel very lucky and blessed to have this online business… especially when I’ve needed “time off.”

Most of March was a wash in terms of getting anything done for the biz.

In spite of all that’s been going on, this is shaping up to be one of my best years in some time.

In February, I had a $10K revenue month with Merch By Amazon and over $13K in total print on demand revenue (Amazon, Etsy, RedBubble, Spreadshirt, Zazzle, etc.)

That was the first time my print on demand income surpassed my largest affiliate income source (GoDaddy’s reseller program).

As great as those numbers look, you have to know that Merch By Amazon is far from being a sure thing. I have invested an insane amount of time on this in the last year, and income is up and down like a roller coaster.

So please do not join Merch expecting your income to grow every month. Mine sure hasn’t. As one of my students said, you have to treat Merch as your vacation money and never rely on it! Nevertheless, I’m completely obsessed with this opportunity!

I also just had another record month with my PSP courses.

As you may remember, my main method for promoting my courses is through podcasting.

For the longest time, affiliate income was my primary focus. Now it’s taking a backseat to course income, and this has been a long-time business goal of mine.

For too many years I was relying very heavily on affiliate income, and I wanted to see a shift.

Just Launched a Course? You’re Not Done!

One thing I’ve learned from my students on Passive Shirt Profits is that your work does not end when you launch your courses.

How many of you have ever thought, “If I can just get my course launched then the hardest part will be over.”

WRONG!!!!

That’s actually when the real work begins.

Creating the course videos was the easy part for me.  The bigger and ongoing challenge has been making sure students can execute!

Just because your course is live doesn’t mean it’s optimized for the best learning experience.

Some people get stuck in areas you might breeze through, or we assume certain things are clearer than they truly are.

Typically your first version of the course is going to be your worst, but your student feedback and questions should help you improve it.

Staying In Touch With Students

I tried something new this year with my Merch Course, and it’s really helped myself as a teacher and several students.

I began sending out weekly strategy tips to students, and many of the tips are very personal to my ongoing experiences with Merch By Amazon.

At first I worried about sending too many emails, but the responses have been awesome!

Students who weren’t selling anything are starting to see sales. I started receiving more “success” emails, and a few even began posting testimonials in my private group!

(I blurred out the name since it’s a private group and I didn’t get permission to share the name.)

Then I woke up to this today….

I eventually want to do one-on-one coaching/training for Merch due to requests, but I’m not ready yet.

However, this feedback and ongoing correspondence with students is prepping me for that when the time is right.

I may experiment with that once things settle down with my dad.

I Took a Marketing DNA Test

If you’ve ever struggled with how you should be marketing your business or even what kind of work you should be doing online, I’d highly recommend The Marketing DNA Test by Perry Marshall (I am NOT an affiliate.)

It revealed a lot about myself as an entrepreneur AND an online teacher.

It was recommended by one of my followers. (Shout out to Mitch!) I thought it would be fun to take.

Based on how you answer 15-20 questions, the test gives you guidance on the best methods to market your site.

It also gives you insight into the kind of work you should be doing based on your strengths and weaknesses.

I’ve always known that I’m doing the kind of work that fits me, but I wanted to see if the results aligned with what I believe about myself.

The results revealed that I excel more with right-brained, creative work and I connect with people best through video.It also said I have a way of getting inside my visitor’s heads that is almost “psychic and sometimes a little bit scary.”However, I’m NOT so great at analytical work that requires a lot of attention to detail.

I’m also not good with thinking on the spot. I need time to gather my thoughts.

That explains why I fall in love with work like writing/blogging, video and T-shirt design creation, but hate overly analytical work.

That also must be why I abandoned my Accounting major in college.

With SEO, I wonder if that’s why I’d always start off using keyword research software but abandon it after I found a niche.

I could never make myself use it to research every keyword I wanted to write about. I always wanted to follow my gut and common sense.

With Amazon, I have my process I use to find a niche/keywords for Merch. But I spend waaaaaaay more time coming up with my actual shirt ideas and working in Photoshop than I do obsessing over research.

The other reason why these Marketing DNA results were so interesting to me is it made me realize the disconnect that exists between how I learn and operate versus some of my students.

Right-brained people learn differently than left-brained people.

Left brained/analytical people prefer structure when learning. They take notes, like to plan everything out, and need to have all their ducks in a row before uploading/launching anything.

I’m the complete opposite.

I don’t like to do extensive planning and preparation. I’m not a note taker and prefer to jump in and figure it out as I go — even if I know everything is not perfect.

I rely on my gut with a lot of decisions I make, whereas left-brained people use more logic and research before they are comfortable moving forward.

One way is not better than the other, and they both have their pros and cons.

However, as a course creator, I’ve had to learn to focus more on the details and methodical steps for people who prefer that type of learning.

I wouldn’t have been able to improve on that if I hadn’t stayed in touch with my students.

So remember, your course is never, ever complete. It should continue to evolve based on the feedback from your students.

I’ve been selling courses for nearly four years and I’m STILL learning.

Anywho, just thought I’d update you all on what’s going on with me. It’s been an up and down year for sure, but I’m taking it one day at a time.

I hope life is treating you well!

Ya know… it’s been so long since I blogged here, I almost forgot my WordPress password.

How’s your 2018 been going for you? Mine has been super busy but extremely productive and more profitable than I expected.

So I thought I’d catch you up on lessons I’ve learned with my new site, struggles, personal growth and other insights.

The Golden Ticket

The year started off on a fun note. I received a Golden Ticket and was invited, along with a few other high-volume sellers, to meet with Amazon about the Merch By Amazon (MBA) program!

We had to sign NDAs (Non Disclosure Agreements), but I CAN say that it made me even more proud and excited to be a part of this amazing passive income opportunity.

They even created a shirt design for us that we got to print ourselves!

The team was super cool and treated us to a nice dinner with some delicious desserts! We were all pretty vocal about the things we like/didn’t like, suggestions, etc.

I can’t lie…

Before the meetup, certain things about Merch would really frustrate me. But after talking to the team it made realize how hard they’re working to improve on many different fronts.

One thing’s for sure…

These people LOVE THEIR COMPANY. You can see Amazon has a certain standard for the kind of people they hire.

The Merch team is extremely passionate and dedicated to the program, and it was really cool to see their energy and positive outlook on the future of (MBA).

Detour Ahead

Merch By Amazon caused a COMPLETE detour with my business in late 2016. I saw the potential and knew I had to focus on it as soon as I got in.

To date, I’ve sold nearly 10,000 shirts on Amazon alone, and never dreamed T-shirts would be a big part of my income stream.

But I’m actually glad Merch distracted me because I was about to make a BIG mistake by creating the site about selling online courses from your WordPress site.

I was trying to force myself into a niche that I wasn’t really passionate about JUST to have a more focused/niche site.

Bad idea.

I also felt some pressure to start a new site because I really wanted to see what it was like to begin TODAY so I could share more relevant lessons. I was definitely forcing ideas for that reason as well.

Thank you, Amazon, for rescuing me from THAT inevitable failure!

The PSP Journey Begins

When I launched Passive Shirt Profits in June of last year, I knew that social media wasn’t going to be a big part of my marketing strategy.

That may sound crazy to you in 2018, but if you know me, you already know that social media marketing has NEVER been a strength OR favorite of mine.

As a matter of fact, MARKETING IN GENERAL has never been a strength.

What you need to understand is that being proficient at teaching, making videos, and being admired online doesn’t automatically qualify you as a great Internet marketer who knows how to sell their own products.

All I knew was that I wasn’t going to stress myself out trying to grow another social media account I would probably abandon.

So I decided to start with podcasting. I really wanted to see how much traction I could gain with doing nothing but focusing on that.

I also wanted to challenge the “Be Everywhere” strategy that a lot of newcomers feel they need to adhere to when starting a website.

My goal was to commit to podcasting weekly to see if it would drive people into my courses. I launched my first show in May, 2017.

Sales Were Off To a Great Start!

You may remember that the initial launch for PSP was great.

It was a good decision to offer a bundle package that was priced lower than the total price of all courses individually because most people bought the bundle.

I made more in the first 3 days of launch than I typically made on Udemy in a month (WITHOUT Udemy discounts.)

But let’s be real.

The sales were mostly from people who found out about PSP from THIS site.

The REAL tell would be the results AFTER the initial launch.

Well let me just say that after launch, things were slow.

Veeeeeery slow!

So slow that I wondered if I should keep podcasting.

But the more I did it, the more I enjoyed it so I decided to keep going in spite of doubts creeping up.

It’s funny how I’m always giving you all pep talks about never giving up, and I had to remember and start using my own advice!

Then in December, things started to slowly turn around.

Suddenly sales went from very sporadic to several per week.

Then in January it was like someone flipped a switch. (I think it had a lot to do with Merch accepting people into the program again.)

So my listeners and email list subscribers who had been waiting to get approved, decided to enroll.

My podcast downloads started increasing and so did my course sales!

I launch a show every Monday so those are the peaks you see. I think it’s very important to maintain a rhythm with podcasting.

I took a 6 week break between Thanksgiving and the New Year, so that’s why you see the spike on January 8th.

But here’s the cool part….

I recently had my BEST. WEEK. EVER. for the PSP courses, and it was really encouraging to finally have a bit more momentum.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not getting numbers like this all the time, but compared to how things started, I’ll take it!

Also notice…

PSP doesn’t get many comments or social shares.

And if that’s what you view to judge the success of a website, well then you’d see it as a complete failure.

But ironically, it’s converting better with courses than this site did with a larger traffic base!

So yeah, no complaints here!

The lesson?

Don’t get caught up in social shares, traffic and comments. They don’t always equate to more income.

Keep Pushing No Matter What!

Let me tell you. It gets quite discouraging in the early days of building a new site as many of you know!

It was a VERY humbling experience after having instant success with 2 Create a Website.

This site just TOOK OFF like a rocket thanks to Google back in the day, and PSP has been NOTHING like that.

I knew I wasn’t going to have the luxury of building up my search engine traffic to 2,000 visits per day in the first two months like I did with 2Create years ago.

Even though I was prepared for a slow start, it doesn’t mean it was easy to swallow.

It took 8 months for me to really feel like momentum was picking up, and I know many people would have given up LONG before then.

That’s why you have to keep pushing and give it time.

And that’s EXACTLY why I wanted to share this.

I think it’s equally important you hear when things are challenging, and not just when they’re great.

You Don’t Have to Be Everywhere

I know how overwhelming some of you feel when you’re just starting online today.

With Instagram, SnapChat, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and so many options to choose from, it can feel like you have a gigantic hill to climb.

But I’m here to tell you to START SMALL.

Most people are never GREAT with every social media site. They typically focus on one or two.

You have to remember, when you see big influencers with 5 and 6-digit followers on multiple sites, usually it’s because they focused on one or two and the other accounts grew because of the success of the initial accounts.

So it’s not like they are spending that much time and energy on every site.

And who cares about the number of followers if you aren’t turning those followers into customers!

Be careful of getting distracted by looking or being popular on social media.

[clickToTweet tweet=”Just because people are clicking LIKE doesn’t mean they will click ‘BUY.'” quote=”Just because people are clicking LIKE doesn’t mean they will also click ‘BUY.'”]

Now THAT’s what I need on a T-shirt!

So focus on ONE platform that fits your style and audience, and commit yourself to growing that for the next 6 months.

The beauty of concentrating on one strategy is it will very clear if it’s working or not.

Kim George wrote a really good article on follower obsessions, and how to choose your best social platform. I envy her commitment and dedication to social media. I just don’t have it.

Set Realistic Goals

I was so proud of myself for setting a podcast goal that I stuck to EVERY SINGLE MONDAY until the Holidays. (I did miss one other week due to a death in the family.)

Staying focused is often a challenge for me, but I stuck with podcasting, even when I wasn’t sure it was the best thing to do.

And the great thing about my show is every episode is only 5-10 minutes long. So it only takes me an hour or so to record, edit and publish each episode.

I set a realistic goal for myself that I knew I could meet, and that is so important.

Plus, it feels sooooooo good to know I don’t HAVE to be on every platform. I no longer get social media marketing FOMO (fear of missing out).

For the record, I’m not suggesting that you ignore social media. I believe most people SHOULD consider using it today. This was just a personal decision for ME. I have a unique situation with multiple income sources (some are recurring), so I didn’t feel like social media was something I HAD to do. Having said that, I TOTALLY APPROVE the podcast-only strategy for starting out — especially if you’re in a niche where podcasting is hot.

Just remember, you don’t have to be everywhere. It’s a myth.

What I Need to Work On & My Personal Growth

Even though I feel PSP has earned what I put into it now (effort wise), there’s so much more I COULD be doing to earn even more.

I’m very happy with what I’ve accomplished, but I still have a ways to go.

I haven’t setup many marketing funnels, don’t do much with landing pages, my email list, etc.

I am now getting help with those aspects of marketing.

Entrepreneurs who are incredibly successful focus on what they do best and outsource the rest. And I’m JUST now getting comfortable with doing more of that.

I’ve also grown a lot personally and professionally in the last year.

I’ve learned to be comfortable saying “NO” to unreasonable requests and being OK with not pleasing everyone (limiting certain levels of help to students only, no coupon expectations, pricing etc.)

I’ve set boundaries for what I will and won’t do in my business both online AND offline.

Boundaries are something a lot of women entrepreneurs struggle with. Google it. It’s like an epidemic!

Maintaining that boundary without feeling selfish or mean has often been a challenge for me. But I had to do something because things were getting out of balance in my business.

Don’t feel sorry for me. I created that monster by operating in “people pleasing” mode.

I just recorded a podcast on this very subject. Stay tuned.

Diversification Continues

It’s also been incredibly rewarding to create additional income streams. That’s something you HAVE to do as an entrepreneur.

My income sources look a LOT different from when I started online, and thanks to Etsy, PSP and Amazon, I’ve developed some new ones in the last 14 months.

And I have to mention AdSense because I’m always asked about it.

My response to that is…

What’s AdSense?

Seriously, if I make a $1,000 month, I’m having a good month. Fortunately, I’ve more than replaced those earnings with other income streams.

One thing’s for sure…

If you expect everything to remain the same out here, you’re in the wrong place. The only constant is change!

Three years from now, I might be talking about Merch in past tense and on to something else. That’s just how it goes.

But I’m going to ride this Merch train ’til the wheels fall off! And it’s been a fun ride!

Anywho, I just wanted to update you all because it’s been a minute since I blogged.

Let me know what you are up to these days, and I hope your 2018 is going grrrrrreat!!

Now that Merch By Amazon has likely frozen the uploads for the rest of the year, that has given me time to catch up on things I’ve neglected…

Like this blog!

Have you joined Amazon’s Influencer Program yet?

It’s been out for many months now, but they recently opened it up to more people and you don’t have to wait as long to get approved.

It’s very much like their affiliate program and managed in the same location, but you receive a personalized page with a vanity URL.

It’s a personalized way to promote products you recommend to your audience without using the long, clunky affiliate URL.

The people who will benefit the most will be bloggers, vloggers and social media mavens who tend to discuss topics that have products sold on Amazon.

For example, if you’re a beauty or tech blogger/vlogger, you may shop a lot on Amazon. No doubt you get questions about what products you use.

This is a great way to display them!

Well instead of creating an affiliate link for the individual products, you can just send them to…

amazon.com/shop/your_link

You can post your vanity URL in your blog posts, social media content and YouTube description like social media diva, Ms. Ileane does in her gear videos.

If you’re interested in joining, I created a 5 minute video to show you how it works.

If you get approved, don’t do what I did. I forgot to use it and got the inactivity warning. They will close accounts that aren’t active.

Hope you enjoy the video!

If you don’t want the Chrome browser scaring your visitors away, here’s what you need to know…

Pages with any kind of form field on them should start with https:// instead of http://.

The “s” stands for secure and encrypts any data submitted through your website’s forms.

If you aren’t using encryption on those pages, starting in October 2017, Google Chrome users visiting your website will see an intimidating “NOT SECURE” message.

Yes, that means your email opt-in forms will trigger this warning too. That’s what makes this relevant to so many site owners.

If your page is encrypted, Chrome will display a padlock and the word “Secure” next to your website URL in the address bar.

Don’t Be Afraid to Ask for Help

Let me start by saying this.

If all this techy stuff makes you nervous, please call your host and ask for help. They may have even better suggestions than I do.

I’ll be mentioning that a lot in this post, so please take my advice if you feel uncomfortable with any of these steps.

I’m doing a lot of disclaiming here because this post is more about a heads-up than a tutorial. Where you host your site will largely determine your steps.

Did You Receive This Email?

If you have a Google Webmaster account and your site is not yet secure, you might have received an email like this…

It lists all the pages that will show a “NOT SECURE” warning in October. The page you see listed above has an email opt-in form on it.

Most of you do not need this to encrypt credit card purchases on your domain. You’re probably using a 3rd party that has encryption already.

You are doing this to prevent annoying Chrome warnings on opt-in and form pages.

That’s why this announcement impacts so many people. I mean, who doesn’t have at least one page on their site with some kind of form?

How to Get Free Encryption

I have dedicated hosting for my most profitable websites through LiquidWeb (affiliate link).

Many hosting plans (especially high-end plans like VPS and dedicated) offer free AutoSSL. See if your host has this.

It took all of 3 minutes for the tech guy to set it up on my server.

Next, I installed the Real Simple SSL WordPress plugin to instantly redirect all my pages from http:// to https.

If you’d rather not use a plugin for redirects, you can manually set this up with your .htaccess file. Call your host and have them set it up.

To verify that SSL is working, I went here to validate it.

Also, I’m not by any means saying this is the best way. It’s just the way I chose to do it, and it also seems to be a very popular and fast option for WordPress users.

If Your Host Doesn’t Have AutoSSL Yet…

I don’t think most of you need to switch hosts or upgrade your plans — especially if you only have a few pages with opt-in boxes and other simple forms.

The video below also shows another FREE way of encrypting your website without buying an SSL certificate.

It’s called Let’s Encrypt, and here are the hosts that support it.

Don’t forget to PLEASE backup your site and database before making any of these changes.

To those of you using Website Palace (GoDaddy), I did call support yesterday because I also have a few sites hosted there on my reseller store as well. We can use Let’s Encrypt (above) but it’s a manual install. The bottom line is, call support and have them walk you through if you choose to install it. I may not even bother since mine are smaller, less significant sites.

Why Doesn’t Everyone Support Let’s Encrypt?

Honestly, hosting companies want you to buy an SSL certificate. So it comes down to money at the end of the day. But I don’t think most of you need to do this.

Thankfully AutoSSL and Let’s Encrypt are slowly rolling out to more and more hosts.

Free AutoSSL vs. Paid SSL Certificate

I won’t even pretend to fully understand all the technical differences between the free AutoSSL and a paid SSL certificate that you purchase from your host.

So anyone who is a pro at this techy stuff, feel free to fill me in.

As long as the web browser shows my site is secure and it validates, then I see no need to buy a traditional SSL certificate.

My web host agreed.

Plus, I’m not taking orders from any of my websites directly. I’m using 3rd party sites, and they already have SSL.

Again, I’m mainly doing this to prevent those Chrome warnings on form (opt-in) pages.

Do You Really Need Encryption?

Yes and no.

If you are taking payments directly from your domain then YES!

If you are not taking payments or collecting sensitive data directly from your domain, you don’t need it from a customer data protection perspective.

But…

That’s not going to stop Chrome from displaying the “NOT SECURE” message on opt-in pages and any other pages that include form fields.

Also, in 2014 Google introduced SSL as a “weak ranking signal.” Well, now it’s a stronger signal. See this article.

So if your site’s reputation with Google is something that concerns you, that’s another reason to look into this.

What About Notifying Google of The Change?

Did you register your website with Google Webmaster Tools?

Hope so!

This is where you verify all the sites you own with Google.

In a Q&A last year, John Mueller of Google confirmed that the engine is smart enough to figure out the change from http to https (provided nothing else changes in your URL).

However, he said you should still add the https version of your site as a new “property” in your Google Webmaster Tools account since it is seen as a separate site.

Also, I use the Google XML Sitemap plugin, and thankfully all my canonical URLs in my post/page headers and sitemap automatically updated to https.

If all this tech talk confuses you, once again, I recommend calling your host. This switch to https has been a VERY standard procedure lately so they should be able to guide you.

Let’s Sum Up Your Options (For WordPress)…

1. If you collect sensitive data directly on your domain (credit cards, addresses, etc.) then you should definitely encrypt your pages. You can use AutoSSL or the Let’s Encrypt option in this video.
2. If you still need to redirect your pages from http to https, use the Really Simple SSL WordPress plugin to redirect your pages from http to https. Easy breezy!
3. If you do not collect sensitive data, then you can wait for your host to get AutoSSL, Let’s Encrypt or do nothing. Just remember, Chrome will warn your visitors on your pages with form fields.
4. If you take orders via a 3rd party site instead of your domain, just ensure the order page starts with https:// or customers will be warned. Most 3rd party sites have taken care of this already.
5. You should only consider buying an SSL certificate if none of the free options work and you collect orders directly from your domain.
6.  After your site has been encrypted with AutoSSL or Let’s Encrypt, validate your site here.

How Important Is This Really?

This is definitely something you should not ignore, but don’t lose sleep over it either.

Google warned us that using https would become a stronger ranking factor over time. Does that mean they will just drop all sites that don’t?

I doubt it, but you might move down a few spots for certain keywords — especially on pages with forms.

It’s really hard to know, and I’d be lying if I said I knew for sure. I just don’t keep up with SEO the way I used to.

If you are one of those people who follows everything Google says to the letter and you are very concerned about your rankings, then you should act on this sooner than later.

I’m actually more concerned about the Chrome warnings scaring people away.

Just remember, if you have opt-in boxes on every page, that means they will all will trigger a “NOT SECURE” message in Chrome starting in October.

Not a good look.

Suggestions Are Welcomed and Encouraged

If anyone would like to offer additional suggestions and advice on SSL/encryption, please feel free to leave comments below.

I have not used Let’s Encrypt yet (the option in the video), so if anyone wants to share their experience with this, feel free to do so.

If your host offers AutoSSL or Let’s Encrypt, feel free to share the name of the company below.

Just remember, you have until October when Chrome will start warning your visitors that your form field pages are not secure.

If you could do me a big favor and tweet about this blog post using the link below, I’d appreciate it.

[clickToTweet tweet=”On 10/1, Chrome will label your website ‘Not Secure.’ Here’s the scoop!” quote=”On 10/1, Chrome will label your website ‘Not Secure.’ Here’s the scoop!”]

I received an alarming DM from one of my e-buddies, Darren of Small Biz Geek.

This is what it said…

Say whaaaaaaaaat?

Now, I will say this…

I know not to ever use “admin” for my username, and I’m aware of the nickname issue.

What’s the nickname issue, you ask?

Always change your admin nickname to something else, otherwise the name shown with your comments will be your username.

Go into Users from your dashboard, and edit your Admin user account. Make sure you change your nickname to something other than your username.

But I had already done that, so I wasn’t aware of any other username vulnerabilities.

Well there’s another one, and it’s a biggy!

The Byline Might Be Exposing Your Username

Darren figured out my login username for my new site, and he didn’t have to hack the database or go to great lengths to figure it out.

All he did was hover over a link in my author byline.

You might have the same vulnerability on your WordPress site, and there’s a very easy fix.

If you have “By [Name]” in your byline that usually shows up underneath your WordPress title, you might be exposing your admin username.

So I wouldn’t risk exposing anyone’s site that was vulnerable, the byline in the above example is not even hyperlinked, but I just wanted to show an example of what it would look like since I ended up removing my byline altogether.

Anywho…

Hover over that name in your byline. (Not all themes show the byline.)

You will notice it goes to http://yoursite.com/author/[name] 

Whatever you see in the [name] is your login username.

How crazy is it that WordPress has not addressed this yet???? As if WordPress is not vulnerable enough!

And since most of us post using our Admin accounts, this is dangerous. You are basically telling the hackers of the world what your WordPress admin login username is.

So all they have to do is run their script to figure out your password. And if it’s super simple then it’s not hard for them to crack into your account.

For the record, hackers easily crack some passwords by running scripts that attempt to figure them out. They typically start alphabetically and go down the list.

a… aa… aaa… aaab… aaabbb and then they had numbers to the end.

Sounds tedious, right? But here’s the deal…

This is happening at a rate of million of attempts per second because it’s a script, so they can go through the millions of combinations VERY quickly.

It’s not like John (or Jane) is sitting at your login screen manually entering each option. This process is totally automated!

Many WP blogs get hacked because they use “admin” as the username and then a super simple password.  That’s why you should always use lowercase, numbers, uppercase and symbols.

If you’re using a password like happy123, then you’re begging to get hacked — especially if your username is exposed in the byline.

For the record, words that can be found in the dictionary are a big no-no — even if you add numbers at the end.

How to Hide Your Username In The Byline

This may seem intimidating at first, but it’s super easy and should only take you about 3-5 minutes.

Darren created a video that explains all this and shows you how to fix the problem. There are also text instructions below.

I would highly recommend you backup your database before making any changes. Pleeeeease!

Text Instructions

If you prefer text instructions, here ya go…

1. Login to your cpanel or hosting account control panel.

2. Go to PHPMyAdmin or whatever database software your host uses. It might just say “Databases.”

Your interface may also look slightly different. I’m on dedicated hosting, and my cpanel just got upgraded. The point is to find phpMyAdmin or your database icon.

You will see your WordPress database name(s) and any other databases you have setup. It should look similar to the image below.

3. Click the name of your database (or the plus sign next to it), and it will expand a list of all the tables inside that database.

4. Look for a table called wp_users (or something similar) and click it. This is where all your blog’s users are stored.

This will bring up a table of all the users in your WordPress database.

5. Find your username for your admin account and click Edit.

You should see a field called user_nicename and it will be the same as your login.

This is the culprit and what you should change IMMEDIATELY! Change it to “webmaster” or anything other than your login username.

6. Click “Go” or “Save” and that should be it.

Now if you use the byline on your posts, your username will no longer be displayed in the hyperlink.

It will show the name you just changed it to, which is OK because it’s not tied to any of your login details.

What Is The Purpose of The User_Nicename Field?

In case you’re worried about breaking something with this change, here’s some reassurance.

The user_nicename field was only created to simplify the URL of the author archives.

It’s a slug to make the author post archive link appear “nicer”, hence the name.

So if your username is something funky with symbols and hyphens, then the user_nicename will simplify the author post archive link (URL).

If you change the user_nicename, you are changing the URL of the author’s archives.

The good news is WordPress will automatically make this change dynamically so you won’t have broken links in your bylines.

But if you happen to manually link to all your author posts somewhere else on your site (rare), then you will have to change those links to the new one.

There really is no need for a byline when you have a single-author blog anyway.  If you use Genesis themes like me, you can easily get rid of it by installing The Simple Edits plugin.

What If Your Theme Doesn’t Have a Byline?

This is pretty common today. A byline might not be coded into your particular theme.

However, even if the byline is not displayed, the author URL still exists because it’s part of WordPress’ dynamic code.

So you can still go to http://yoursite.com/author/[admin_username]. But if your theme doesn’t link to your author archives, then it would be nearly impossible to find.

Nevertheless, it still exists if you go to it manually. So I’ll leave that up to you to decide if you are going to change it or not.

—————-

Thank you, Darren for alerting me of this! This is such an important issue so I want to spread the word as you have done on your blog.

I can’t believe I’ve used WordPress all these years and have never come across this info!

Look-a-here, ladies and gents! All WordPress users need to know about this. Please spread the word by tweeting the link below, especially if you have a website that targets bloggers.

[clickToTweet tweet=”WordPress is exposing your admin username! Here’s how to fix it!” quote=”WordPress is exposing your admin username! Here’s how to fix it.”]

My T-shirt tutorial website is live and I have never been more excited about a website launch!

Why?

Because for the first time I feel like I’m doing things in the RIGHT order.

Even though 2 Create a Website has had tremendous amounts of success, I always felt like I did a lot of things backwards.

For example, I waited way too long to start a list, sell products, etc. That’s largely because I didn’t have to.

Having said that, it worked very well for me because I got an early start and was able to capitalize on search engine optimization, residual affiliate programs that I still earn from today and other advantages you gain as an early adopter.

But things have evolved since I launched this site, and my strategy has to evolve as well.

When I launched a website many years ago, I’d focus on building up a ton of content for search engine traffic and monetize that free info with affiliate links ads.

That won’t work as well today.

I also care more about building a list and selling my OWN products instead of someone else’s.

In this post I will discuss what I am doing differently with my new site, and how I’ve grown in a business sense.

But first…

Say Hello to Passive Shirt Profits!

If you’ve been following me lately, you can’t be surprised about a new website.

Since getting into Merch by Amazon last fall, I have been completely obsessed with print on demand — the process of uploading an image, adding it to a product and earning a royalty when it’s sold.

By the end of this year, I will cross the six figure mark in royalties, and most of those earnings have come recently.

I’ve also branched out and I’m selling designs in over 25 different niches/topics thanks to Merch.

Not bad for a part-time gig!

I decided to create Passive Shirt Profits for two main reasons:

• I want to diversify my income with courses and not just rely on the very unreliable POD income
• There is a gap in the market when it comes to helping newbies learn software as it relates to creating T-shirt designs

I keep hearing people in the POD world complain about Photoshop or Illustrator being difficult to learn, and I say to myself, “That’s ’cause you haven’t taken my courses!”

I don’t want to just focus on individual print on demand sites like Merch By Amazon.

I want to teach practical skills such as coming up with creative shirt concepts for many niches (one of my secret weapons with Merch By Amazon) and software.

It seems so many people are doing Merch sites and courses with a lot of the same info. I want mine to include more practical lessons.

That’s why it’s important to research what potential competitors are doing and pay attention to comments in private groups, forums, etc. I used this as inspiration for my upcoming courses.

With that being said, let’s get into what I’m doing differently…

I Started an Email List Early

I will never, ever, ever, launch another site again without having an email list.

I didn’t launch one for this site until 2010. By that time, 2 Create a Website was eight years old!

I also did not have any products to sell at the time, so I didn’t really utilize my email list to the fullest.

This time I started an email list immediately, and thanks to my private group and podcast I already have 31 subscribers after just 2 weeks.

The Podcasting Hype is Real

I launched my PSP Podcast on May 29th without announcing it, and had 30+ downloads and two email subscribers within the first week.

(I have a call to action for my list at the end of the episodes.)

That goes to show that people are searching and listening to podcasts about Merch and print on demand, so choosing that as one of my traffic methods seems to have been a good choice.

Podcasting is always a great option for money/business topics anyway.

After two weeks, I’ve already had 150 downloads! (The additional traffic boost came from announcing it to my private group after the first week).

By the way, I’m loving Pat Flynn’s Smart Podcast Player! (No affiliation) It’s so functional and works great on mobile too!

I love that people can listen to all shows in one place on my landing page, search episodes and share on social media — all in one concise, mobile-friendly interface!

I am Not Waiting Eons to Launch a Product

Three courses for PSP are already complete, and should be out within a week or so. Make sure you are on my list if you want to be notified.

I’m just waiting for my reviewers to give me feedback so I can polish them up before launch.

One reason I’m announcing the site before the courses launch is so I’ll have people on my list.

And it feels super encouraging to have people in my private group actually ASK me when the courses are coming out!

That’s confirmation there is demand for what I’m teaching, and that’s always a plus when you create a site and product.

Also, when you wait a long time to launch a product, you may struggle with what to include and what to leave out because you already have so much published content.

This was a huge struggle with me on this site when I first launched my affiliate course in 2014.

It took me a full year of updates to finally get it to a point where there is a significant amount of different info that I don’t have elsewhere.

Now I understand why people say your first course draft is always your worst because you are constantly adding/improving over time.

And just for the record, it’s totally fine to include material in your course that you’ve covered in blog posts, emails, etc. (especially if you are upfront about it). I personally wanted it to have a lot of new material.

I didn’t struggle with that with PSP because I have very little content out here on this subject, and that was completely intentional.

I Simplified The Site Layout

I cannot believe I actually have a website with only one column!

At first I thought it would feel restrictive.

Then I realized I actually enjoy reading clean sites with lots of white space (especially on mobile), and I rarely pay attention to the sidebar links and widgets.

More importantly, when I check my Google Analytics I realized how many people have the same browsing habits! 

Because more and more people browse on mobile devices now, that means the sidebar drops below the main content (if your theme is responsive).

As a result, many people don’t even see your sidebar, much less click on the links!

So I made the decision to go with a minimalist design approach. We’ll see how long that lasts!

There’s not a lot to do at PSP just yet, and that was done for a reason.

Right now, I’m focusing on podcasting and building my list for the upcoming courses. I’m keeping it very simple right now so I can track certain activities.

I’m using the Maker Pro StudioPress theme. (affiliate link)

I Paid More Attention To What My Audience Needs

This is the first time I’ve ever had a niche community prior to building a website and it was very helpful.

The great thing about starting a private group before launching a site and product is that I have been able to gain insight into what people struggle with so I can address those issues in my courses.

When you create a course, it’s easy to fall into the trap of adding what YOU think is important, but a customer might value something else.

Here you are going on and on about step B and your audience is yelling….

“Hey!! But wait! You didn’t even explain step A well enough!”

We make a lot of assumptions when we’re creating our products and many times it’s because we don’t really know what people want.

In addition, we’re often too close to the subject and assume people know or will learn it the way that we did. So we skip what we think is obvious to us, but it might not be obvious to the student.

I am also having people review my courses before launch. I also did this with my Spreadshirt course, and I promised to never launch without this step.

It’s always good to get a person in your target audience to view the course with fresh eyes from THEIR perspective.

Again, we are often so close to our content, we miss key information that someone might need.

I’m Starting With a 101 Course

I’ve read over and over again that you should always have an intro course to upsell other advanced courses.

Plus, if someone likes your intro course they are much more likely to buy more.

So for example, I have a 101 course for someone who knows absolutely nothing about print on demand, what software to buy, etc.

The follow-up courses are on brainstorming, software, etc.

I’m also planning to have smaller courses and then offer a bundle that will be less expensive than buying each course individually.

My first courses on Udemy taught me a lot about what students like and don’t like. Those lessons were invaluable.

I’ve learned from feedback that people like…

• a mix of text and video content
• shorter videos (My avg. video length is 5 min)
• shorter courses (No more than 90 minutes)

I’m using Thinkific (no affiliation), and I’ll do another post about why I chose them and ditched Teachable at the last minute. Thanks, LaTosha for the push to switch.

(Learn why I won’t be uploading to Udemy anymore.)

I’m Learning to Set Boundaries

If you value your sanity and want people to respect that your time is valuable, you HAVE to learn to set boundaries for yourself and business.

There was a time when I would do a LOT for people for free, and while I know people appreciated it, I now realize some abused it.

Even worse…

It drained the heck out of me!

And PLEASE don’t feel sorry for me because I allowed it. I’m sharing this so YOU don’t fall into the same trap I did.

The one incident that sticks out in my mind was when I helped a gentleman with his website code. We went back and forth for 3 days until the issue was finally resolved.

He praised me for the help I gave him and I felt awesome.

A week later he was back with another site issue…

And then another…

And another.

Now multiply this story by several others over the course of many years.

From the outside, it looked generous and helpful. I genuinely DO enjoy helping people.

But trying to help everyone came with a price…

1. I began to feel overwhelmed, stressed and started to experience burnout.
2. I was teaching people that my time doesn’t cost a dime and some began to expect it.
3. I had less time to work on my own stuff

Keep in mind, I’m not just talking about answering questions that require one or two sentence answers. I certainly don’t mind it when people email me with questions.

In fact, I welcome that!

I’m talking about extensive work like helping people with code, coming up with strategies for their sites and things that took a lot of time — especially when you are doing this for several people per month.

(Not to mention I was also doing this for people in my personal life for free.)

That’s one of the reasons I decided to open my Facebook group to students only. That was my first small step into the world of setting boundaries.

Two years ago, I would have felt selfish saying all this, and would have NEVER admitted this on my blog.

Don’t let anyone make you feel guilty for setting those boundaries. Also, don’t complain about people sucking up your time without paying if you’re allowing it.

There’s an old saying that goes…

You teach people how to treat you.

That holds true in every area of life, even business.

While I will never change how I operate in terms of integrity and ethics online, I have learned that it is OK to say “no” and set boundaries for what I will and won’t do for free.

If I Could Start Over…

Creating this new site caused me to reflect a LOT on 2 Create a Website.

If I could launch this all over again I would have kept the content much more focused instead of covering Internet marketing, earning online AND WordPress.

Website creation or blogging might seem specific enough at first, but it attracts people who want to create so many different kinds of sites and their reasons for the site varies.

I would get questions on how to create sites I had no idea or interest in creating, as a result, I alienated potential subscribers and customers right off the bat.

Looking back, I would have narrowed down the focus to tutorials for creating a specific kind of site like an infopreneur website — which is really what this site is.

So if you’re looking to create a site in this space, make note of that. Don’t be afraid to narrow the focus down.

Everyone and their mama  has a how-to blogging site these days, but not many are “niching down” to a type of website (ecommerce, membership, infopreneur, etc.), and I think there are major opportunities there.

It may feel like you are alienating people, but what you’re doing is attracting a very specific audience that will be easier to target content to.

This Isn’t Goodbye…

…It’s more like “hello” to new lessons!

While I may not be blogging or podcasting here regularly (it’s not like I have been anyway!), I will certainly be back to share the lessons along the way like I am now.

Having a new site will make my content here even more helpful if you’re also doing some of the same things.

So you’re not getting rid of me that easily!

Having said that, I will be focusing more of my attention on PSP due to the fact it’s new and I will be dedicating time to helping students when the courses launch.

I’m Growing Up!

This has been such a journey, and I’m so happy to be able to share these lessons with you.

I’ve been in transition for quite a while now with my business, and I finally feel like I’m moving in the right direction.

One thing’s for sure…

There is a big difference between monetizing free content with ads and affiliate links and selling your own products when it comes to overall strategy.

I have learned how much I truly did NOT understand about business and setting boundaries.

It’s ironic that people often come to me for coaching on starting an online business when I feel like I’m JUST now grasping many of the core fundamentals.

Kinda crazy, right?

But I don’t regret a thing I did or any mistake I made because that’s how I learned.

You have to put things out there and make mistakes so you can learn what to do, and more importantly, what NOT to do!

So the journey continues…

Oh boy.

It’s time for me to eat some crow.

And that’s REALLY difficult for me to do because I have a fear of certain birds.

Anyway…

There are articles all over the Web about why discounting your products is bad.

I ignored them and thought that was odd advice.

Some of you warned me about Udemy.

I ignored that too.

My goal was to make my courses affordable for people to learn, and many of you praised me for that.

But I didn’t really understand the long-term limitations of a pricing structure like Udemy’s.

If you have not launched your product yet and/or are considering Udemy to sell your online courses, please pay attention.

There’s also a podcast for this post. If you’d like to listen, scroll to the bottom.

Constant Discounting Creates a Price Ceiling

The ongoing discount strategy is NOT good for the long run, and it often creates a proverbial ceiling when it comes to what some people will pay.

[clickToTweet tweet=”Offering too-frequent discounts trains people to buy only when there’s a sale.” quote=”Offering too-frequent discounts trains people to buy only when there’s a sale.”]

When a large discount is the #1 motivating factor for purchasing, you attract a lot of people who…

• Put off starting/completing the course
• Don’t take action
• Are less motivated (because they haven’t invested much money)
• Are more likely to expect a coupon before buying again (This one is HUUUUUGE!)

As a result, you have to sell a lot of cheap products to make worthwhile money, and you often end up with a less engaged student due to the low risk/investment.

Of course this is not ALWAYS the case, but I have a good sample size of Udemy stats to study and the results are clear…

When I opted out of the Udemy promotions last Summer, it was amazing to see the increase in course engagement/completion and how the average ratings improved.

The bottom line is…

[clickToTweet tweet=”Don’t price low. Pack your product with value, and charge what it’s worth.” quote=”Don’t price low. Pack your product with value, and charge what it’s worth.”]

Should You Avoid Udemy?

If you care more about the volume of students, and are not concerned with the amount you earn per sale, then Udemy is fine.

Just understand that your income will largely depend on how much Udemy promotes your course (if you cannot drive sales yourself). And many of your students will never pay more than a certain price.

Notice I didn’t say “ALL” but “MANY.”

There are instructors on Udemy who are doing very well and are happy with their model. So I would never say it’s bad for everyone.

It’s just not for ME anymore, and I won’t be uploading there again.

Even though I’ve opted out of the discounts, there is still an unspoken expectation for what my courses SHOULD sell for because they are on a notoriously discounted platform.

I know this to be true because I’ve gotten messages in my inbox from people begging for coupons.

One guy was so relentless, I had to block him after the 10th message in a 3 day period.

Another guy criticized me because my courses weren’t part of the promotions.

Oh the NERVE of me for not selling a 3 hour course for 15 bucks!

I had two emails this morning from someone asking for a coupon.

And when people on Udemy ask for a coupon, they don’t want $5 or $10 off.

They want 75 to 90% off.

I’m Done.

This is exactly why Udemy is a bad choice for people who want to sell courses over a certain amount. That discount expectation is a killer.

They tried to fix this last year with a limited discount structure, but it flopped badly.

Just like JCPenneys discovered when trying something similar, they realized people need to FEEL they’re getting a discount.

Udemy knew they had to change it back so they could keep profits up. It may not benefit all the instructors, but it benefits THEIR bottom line.

So it really doesn’t matter what you price your course if you’re opted in to the discounts.

In most people’s eyes the value is always under $25.

That expectation is always there, and if you don’t offer that, you may look sleazy or like you’re trying to rip someone off.

It doesn’t matter how detailed your course is or that it’s 3 hours long. It “should” be cheap because it’s on Udemy.

Students wait for the next promotion, and it’s typically just a few weeks away.

And who could blame them? Why wouldn’t they wait for a discount? That’s the precedent Udemy set.

I’m just glad we can opt out.

I do get full-price marketplace sales (referred by Udemy) quite often for my affiliate course, but I bet they are from new students who haven’t figured out the “Udemy system” yet.

I also hate how their pricing looks scammy. “Oh, let me price my 30 minute course at $200 when I know it will sell for $20.”

Nope.

When you opt out, YOU control your prices.

Think Long Term When Setting Prices

The decision to start cheap will always hurt my course sales in some way because I set a low price expectation.

So if you want to control how much your course will sell for, you should consider other options like Teachable (where my future courses will be uploaded).

My 2create courses will stay on Udemy (minus the Udemy promos, of course) for now, and existing students will always have access to them even if I stop selling there. It’s part of their terms.

The truth is, only a small percentage of Udemy instructors earn a substantial amount of money selling courses cheap.

If you happen to have a top course in an in-demand niche, you could make five figures per month selling courses at $10 or $15 due to Udemy promoting your course for you.

Just remember that if you rely on Udemy for your sales, a competitor could come along with a better course and Udemy may promote their course over yours.

Many instructors feel trapped and obligated to participate in the Promotions because without them, they would hardly make anything due to the fact the students look for the discounts and they don’t have an audience.

Well I don’t feel obligated at all — even if that means I earn less.

I have no regrets about opting out of the Promotions last year.

I would much rather have 5 students who pay $100 than 100 students who pay $10.

When people invest more into a course, they are far more likely to complete it, act on the content and buy ANOTHER course for the same price or more.

If you attract more students that really NEED your course and not just motivated by a discount, you’ll make more in the long run.

So you have to sell fewer courses to reach your income goals, and you’re getting paid for your work.

“I Can’t Afford That Price!”

So how do you deal with people who complain about price?

If people are used to discounts, no doubt those comments will come. I get this all the time now that I opted out of the Promotions.

You simply explain that you invested a lot of time into creating your product, and your price is set to reflect that.

Why should you disregard the work you put into creating something just because someone doesn’t want to pay?

A higher price will help communicate the value of those who are ready to commit time and money, and drive those away who aren’t.

It’s that simple.

I’m no longer afraid of driving people away like I was before.

It’s about learning to create a product that people NEED and WANT instead of trying to target anyone and everyone by dangling a cheap price in their face.

Private Groups Are Beneficial

Creating a private Facebook group for my Spreadshirt (and future POD T-shirt design students) has been a learning tool for me as a course creator.

It’s helped me learn where I need to improve with structuring my courses.

I am listening to the problems that people have and noticed a common theme with the challenges many of you face that I wouldn’t have picked up on without the group.

I’ve had several A-HA moments!

This gives me direction with my upcoming 101 print on demand course.

So it’s not just about jacking up your prices. You also have to improve, deliver and give people what they need and want.

It’s a two-way street.

So having a group where you can interact with your potential students is great because you can learn about what they want and where they struggle most.

I will certainly use this info for my future courses.

I’m working hard to ensure the courses are setup for optimal learning and easy implementation.

I have to do my part too.

Quantity Doesn’t Matter

This may be hard to believe, but I don’t care about high enrollment numbers right now.

If I did, I’d still be opted in to the Udemy promotions.

For me, it’s about removing that cheap course expectation and finding the right price point that…

• reflects value and doesn’t look cheap
• pays me back for the time invested
• is affordable

And you know what?

I STILL don’t have the perfect formula for pricing a product. I’m going to be testing and welcome you to share what you’ve learned.

But I can tell you this…

Giving products away for cheap is NOT the answer for me.

If you’ve benefited from my discounts then you might not like this. It might look greedy or that I’ve changed.

Well you’re right.

I have changed.

I’ve learned that it makes no business sense to price below the value for the long run.

As you can see, I’m such a work in progress when it comes to all this selling stuff, but I wanted to share what I’ve learned.

Listen To The Podcast

This topic was so important that I decided to also do a podcast. You can listen below or right-click this link and download the mp3 file here.