I am the luckiest and happiest
human being alive...

Hi Ken,

Has it really been 15 months?

I had meant to write much sooner, back in April/May 2007.

Why then? Because I went on a camping trip to central Australia. (Read: a tax deductible research trip to gather photos and stories for my websites.)

I spent six weeks camping, swimming and hiking, and checked out every single gorge and chasm, every mountain range and track, everything that could be of interest to readers. Tough job, I know. But someone has to do it.

Each day, I met people who asked me the same thing: "Where have you been? Where are you going? How long have you been on the road? When do you have to be back home? What do you do for a living?"

"This is it," I would say, "I do this for a living." And I explained how I earn money from my SBI! sites. I always walked away from those conversations with the same thoughts: "I love my life. I am the luckiest and happiest human being alive and never ever in a million years will I be able to thank you enough for it, Ken."

That's when I wanted to write an update, just to get that off my chest.

But was that enough for an update? Shouldn't I do some "real" work first? Get some more visitors to my site so I can report a big increase in income or something like that?

Well, I did do some very real work on the sites, and I now have plenty to report!

In my initial case study, I wrote that I was about to launch a third site. I did. And shortly after, I had a brilliant idea for a fourth site, so I did that as well. And then I had a million ideas for my two original sites, so I went back to working on those...

To cut a long story short, sites #3 and #4 are still very new and I've hardly done anything with them. Yet both receive between 100 and 200 visitors a day. They already pay for themselves and a bit extra, so there is no rush. (And #5, my first joint venture project with a fellow SBIer, is also in the works.)

But let's get back to my original two sites. In my initial case study, I said that I wanted to look beyond Google's AdSense to make money. Um, the truth is that in that respect I was very slack for most of 2007. The Google money kept showing up in my account every month, and the bills got paid. It's so easy to procrastinate...

But then I had a bit of a wake-up call. A few things came together:

• The Kimberley and Outback Australia are seasonal destinations. My advertisers always spend less money in the second half of the year.
• Overall, advertisers seem to spend less than they did a year ago, possibly due to the economic downturn in the US.
• The drop in the US/Australian Dollar exchange rate affected my income.

The result? By November 2007, traffic to my outback site had increased to over 3000 visitors a day - doubled since writing the original case study - but income hadn't followed. Initially it rose only slightly. Then very slightly. In November it did not go up at all, though traffic still did.

My bills were paid. I made more money than I did a year before or even six months before. But the moderate increase in income did not match the huge increase in popularity and traffic. It was a clear sign that I wasn't doing all I could be doing.

I'd been somewhat lazy and this was a well-deserved kick in the you-know-where. So I finally sat down and followed through on an idea that had been in the back of my head for a long time:

I wrote an e-book.

From the questions and feedback of visitors to my Kimberley site (www.kimberleyaustralia.com), I knew there was demand for a detailed travel guide to the Kimberley.

It took about three months to pull together. The technical side was a huge learning curve for me.

Once more it became clear that the SBI! forums alone are worth the price of SBI! - their posts and the many helpful articles written by fellow SBIers in the HQs (TNT and Monetization) have got to be the most amazing business and income-building resources on the planet. The world's best kept secret! But I digress...

I offered the book to my newsletter subscribers on the 1st of March. I was a nervous wreck when I finally hit the "Send" button for that newsletter issue, but I needn't have worried. The results exceeded my wildest expectations.

I sold 80 books in the first week. It was a great boost for the bank account, but more importantly, people LOVED the guide. Phew.

Eight days later, I started offering the guide publicly from my Kimberley website. It has been selling well ever since.

Writing this e-book has increased my income by about $2000 a month. Just like that. I am STILL a bit stunned at those results.

The guide went live in March and I am writing this at the end of April. This is the good half of the year, so while I wasn't looking, my Adsense earnings had also recovered. February saw my highest advertising income ever, March was higher still, and April looks like it will exceed that new baseline.

I know what I SHOULD be doing now. I should get serious about sites #3 and #4. Those topics would peak when my travel sites are quiet and would help even out the ups and downs of my particular market.

What I WILL be doing is probably take it easy until I get the next kick in the rear. Hey, it's human nature and the bills are paid.

And then, come May, the rivers will drop and all the 4WD tracks across Australia's northwest will open up. And if I want to keep my sites current and relevant then I'd better go and check to be sure that all those beaches and waterfalls and gorges are still as gorgeous as they were last year.

It's a tough job, but someone has to do it!