People create Internet businesses for all sorts of reasons. Some of them are looking to give up their J.O.B.s. Some dream of being of being their own boss. And others can\’t wait to make tons of cash, retire to their private island and leave the work of traffic generation, content production and ad monitoring to their staff.
That\’s all fine. I don\’t have a problem with any of those reasons. Provided they\’re all accompanied by another one…
… that they\’re doing it because they enjoy it.
I\’m not just saying that because life\’s too short to do work you hate, although that\’s a good enough reason by itself. And I\’m not saying it just because I want you to be happy, although I do.
I\’m saying it because if you don\’t enjoy building an Internet business, you\’ll never be any good at it.
If you aren\’t passionate about the content you produce, your readers won\’t be either. Passion is a necessary part of leadership and every Internet publisher is a leader of a community of readers. No one is going to follow someone who doesn\’t think their topic is worth getting excited about.
If you don\’t get a thrill every time you see your page views increase, then you\’re not going to care enough to continue taking the measures that bring in more people. It takes effort and thought to identify what your readers want – even when they don\’t know what they want. Your stats need to make you smile.
And if you don\’t get a real buzz when you see the check from Google, from Chitika, from Kontera and from your affiliates, then you won\’t be receiving too many more of them in the future.
Internet publishing is work. It takes effort and time, and not everything you have to do to build a successful website is going to be fun. I can\’t say that I\’ve ever enjoyed search engine optimization, and figuring out which keywords to target can be tedious.
But on the whole, I love it. I love creating the products. I love managing my sites. I love the people I\’ve met and continue to meet at conferences and workshops. And I love the fact that I can make a living doing something I love.
If you want to be successful, you need to love it too.