Sean, Affiliate Marketer

Hello everyone, I already feel like we have a lot in common.  My name is Sean and I live in Michigan.  I am 38, have been married for 16 years and we have 3 children (5, 11, 13).

I have been involved with affiliate marketing since June 2005 as hobby.  I have to cut this post down to size, so I’ll leave out the details of how I got involved with affiliate marketing.

I first heard of BANS around 14 months ago while I was browsing a forum.  I was interested in it because I was using a comparison shopping engine script, niche databases and some affiliate website creators to create these small niche websites and online malls to earn affiliate commissions.  But, even with all of my websites and domains, I was barely able to pay for my own hobby.  I squeezed out enough money for a family trip every year and Christmas.  Clearly not enough to enable me to quit my dayjob.

Currently, I own over 800 domain names and have around 180 live websites (most are not optimized).  Finding good domain names is a hobby of mine. I compare domain names to real estate. 

In June of 2007, I was separated from my employer after 12 years of service.  I was a computer technician for a Fortune500 company, they have been off shoring work for several years and it was just a matter of time before my tech job was sent overseas.  I always felt secure in my job, but something always told me to watch my back. I still remember the day I was let go – I had no warning and was given 10 minutes to clear my desk while the supervisors watched to make sure I didn’t tamper with anything.  I commuted with other people and they were all shocked and couldn’t believe I was let go.  Coroporate wide laid off about 1,000 employees. But really, I have no hard feelings for being laid off or fired.  On the way home that day I was kind of relieved.  It was a stressful job and I was commuting over an hour each way to work – that’s 2 hours a day in a car pool.  And a commute in the winter snow and ice is not fun.  I did that for 4 years because they moved our jobs to a different location.  Two hours a day is a lot of lost fishing and family time – even time lost making some stores.

Anyway, it was a good thing that I had a part time hobby to fall back upon to supplement my income – because the unemployment check really isn’t much and it didn’t even make the mortgage payment.  Needless to say, with no savings – money was tight and tension was high in our house.  We thought about bankruptcy, but I used to be a bill collector at a credit union and it didn’t feel right to do that.  After trying to find a job with another employer, my job search wasn’t giving me the results I wanted – I spent over two months looking for a job.  But, during a job interview, I light bulb came on in my head during my conversation with the company’s owner.  I asked him questions about his business and then during the conversation – he boldy stated that he would never work for someone else ever again – just as he was saying that – I was saying the same thing.

I went home and devoted a lot of time to my BANS “Empire”.  I still made time to fish, being couped inside all day will drive you nuts.  I was starting to dabble in PPC Advertising a few months back, before the layoff, with one of my sites and it was turning a small profit – probably spent $5 a day in advertising.  I knew that if I was to going to get some results and a positive cash flowing coming in, I was going to have to take a risk.  I started with my stores that made a small profit and the one site that I used with PPC Advertising.  I used my severance pay to fund the advertising and started by churning out more stores to use with PPC.  It was a gamble and without taking a risk, I would never know if I could be successful.  I had nothing to lose and if it wasn’t for the fact that l lost my job – I’d probably be doing the same day after day job I was doing before and wouldn’t have taken the risk to fully venture on my own.  Needless to say, the risk has paid off – I wouldn’t recommend it for the faint at heart.  I was very nervous, but I would do it again and that’s what I now do full time.

I have been on my own boss since September 2007 and haven’t looked back – I’m sure my neighbors wonder what I do for a living since my cars never leave my driveway anymore.  Just think of all that gas money I’m now saving.  In late August 2007 I became a certified Google Adwords Professional and drive a large percentage of my traffic with Adwords. 

My goal is to develop my SEO Skils.

Here are some of my stores – I use Frontpage and Photoshop:
ATVs For Sale
Discount Zippo Lighters
Online Computer Shop

I just put this one up this Saturday Guitar Tab Books

Previously Published Articles You May Like to Read:

• Sean’s Performace – Update 1
• How does Sean get an idea for a Niche Store?
• Sean’s Site Performance, Niche 1-2

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