Have you ever considered paying $150 for an email?
Are You Ready To Work Your Ass Off to Earn Your Lifestyle?
Are you tired of the daily grind? With a laptop and an internet connection I built a small website to generate income, and my life completely changed. Let me show you exactly how I’ve been doing it for more than 13 years.
I have. Ridiculous?
Maybe. Maybe not.
What am I even talking about?
I literally paid someone to write an email for me to send out to my list.
And I paid that writer one hundred and fifty dollars so far.
There’s 5 emails in the series.
That’s $750 total I plan to fork out.
If you asked me in 2010 if I’d spend almost $1,000 on a series of emails I would not have believed you.
In this instance it made sense though.
- I wanted to promote a product I was unfamiliar with
- I have traffic related to that product
- This traffic makes some sales, but I think it can make more
The biggest issue for me is that I don’t have time to learn everything about the product.
I’m not an expert.
I needed an expert to help me out.
Plus, that expert needed to be able to do email marketing.
So I need an expert + expert.
Apparently those are very expensive.
I placed a job on Upwork.com.
About 10 people applied.
There was only one candidate who was clearly qualified.
Bad news: He charges $150 per email.
Math time.
The product I want to promote is $500 and pays 40% commission.
That’s $200 per sale.
So I only have to make four sales to break even.
I can do that in a month, easy.
After that, I get to keep those emails.
I can send them every month.
My initial investment of $750 now makes me hundreds of dollars per month.
Do I want you to start buying emails?
Nope. (Unless it makes sense for your business.)
My point is just to say that every day, when you write content, you are building a skill.
That skill is worth money.
There are opportunities to make money online all around you.
Start reading your emails more closely.
Someone got paid to write those.
Practice your writing skills.
Learn how email marketing works.
Build a list and send out test emails to see what gets people to take action.
YOU are your business.
INVEST IN YOURSELF
I still love affiliate marketing.
But it can take some time to get traction.
If there’s any point where you are struggling to fund your affiliate marketing efforts, try to sell your writing skills.
You can make a lot of money with them.
How do I know?
For one, I pay people that much. So someone is earning that cash.
Another example is this guy earning $100k from SEO writing skills. (Here’s 10 basic SEO tips to get you started.)
Now, let’s look at my $500 blog post.
It’s kind of a sad story.
It’s about a $500 blog post.
Earlier this year I contracted a writer.
His job?
Write a comprehensive “guide” for my website.
Basically, just a very big blog post. 3,000 – 5,000 words
I needed this to be great content.
The BEST.
It’s a big keyword, and I wanted to rank.
Lots of people applied to my job posting on UpWork.com.
The #1 candidate wanted $0.10 per word.
Ouch.
I like to pay $.03-.05.
This was going to be pricey.
When all was said and done, the post was over 5,000 words long.
And it cost me over $500.
I’m not ashamed to admit, I cried a little. (LOL)
Fast forward six months.
Here’s the sad part of the story 🙁
The post doesn’t rank.
It doesn’t make sales.
It doesn’t even make much ad revenue.
I’m really trying to SEO it with signals and tricks
Nothing is working.
Guess what though.
That writer got paid.
Another reason why writing is a great gig.
Writers make money by delivering a product.
They write. They get paid. Real simple.
Unfortunately, the same is not always true for affiliate marketing.
Sometimes you write all day and make $0.
(the flip side is that sometimes you do nothing and make bank!)
Writing is super lucrative in the online space.
Make sure you know what your skills are worth!
Oh, and you can do more than just writing content.
There are many other valuable skills like:
- Social media management
- PPC ad creation writing & management
- Guest posting (link building)
- On/Off Page SEO
- Hosting management
- Building & Troubleshooting WordPress websites
In other words, you don’t have to be a super savvy business guru to make money online.
Some very basic online skills can be worth a lot of money.
But can you make six-figures per year?
Yup.
Let’s turn it up a notch and look at how writing can earn $100k.
After that, I’ll talk about my $30k day
(Yes, that thing made of 24 hours)
Earning six figures online isn’t easy.
I wish I had a personal story that was simple to replicate.
You know, “Do this and earn a ton of money”.
My journey has been up and down over many years.
The same is true if you want to earn $100k+ writing online.
But it is possible!
Here’s a couple example stories of writers making six figures.
Most of those people started out as writers.
Then they transitioned into “agencies”.
They basically help writers find clients.
They’ve discovered how to branch out.
I’m not saying this is the best choice for you.
But it’s an option. What a cool service!
You help writers find clients. You help clients find writers.
Everyone gets paid, or get a service they need.
In fact, there’s a lot of variation in how much writers get paid.
You have to know your own value.
If you know basic SEO, keyword, and sentence structure…
That’s a lot of value already.
Just insert one specialized skill or knowledge area, and suddenly you’re a high-demand writer.
A highly specialized writer with SEO skills can absolutely make a ton of money writing for other people.
One of my best earning days was $30,000 in one day. (Not joking, but a small hyperbole)
I sold a website.
It was earning $1k/month in affiliate commissions.
So it wasn’t like I just go paid for doing nothing LOL.
I had to build it right?!
Selling websites can fetch between 20x and 40x monthly earnings.
If your site is earning $1k/month,
You can sell it for $20k – $40k depending on other metrics (traffic, age, seasonality, etc).
Let’s break down what $1,000/month looks like.
30 days in a month.
That’s $33/day.
How many sales is that?
Depends on what you’re selling.
Just for example let’s say you earn $10/sale.
That’s three sales per day.
Millions upon millions of people search online every day.
You just need three sales.
Yeah, you gotta work for them.
No, they won’t land in your lap on day one.
Also, you might work for six months and see nothing,
Then get 40 sales in month 7, and 200 sales in month 8.
Success tends to snowball like that.
Getting back to the example, it’s very possible for a website to earn $1000/month in the first year of operation.
I’ve seen it done before. ==> 7 Months, $4550
Just a few sales a day could turn into an extra $30k/year.
That’s definitely something you can do in the evenings and weekends.
You know what? It all ties back to the writing skill I’ve been talking about.
That website I sold was content written by me.
Just hanging out in my bedroom.
Reading and writing, then publishing on my blog.
Writing is one of the most valuable skills online.
Whether you get paid $150 per email, $500 per blog post, or sell a site for $30k…
Having good writing skills can get you PAID.
If you are not confident in your writing,
Take a course.
This is a free resource on my site.
It covers the basics of writing a 500 word essay.
It’s a good way to start if you are not confident in your writing skills.
If you have the basics down, cool.
Let’s take your from basic high school essay, to marketing guru mastermind.
You can get paid a lot of money to be savvy online, as we discovered so far.
Writing pays A LOT (if you have the right skill set).
This article on Backlinko is incredible.
It’s called SEO Copywriting, 17 Powerful Secrets.
Normally, I don’t make a big deal out of “techniques”.
Most of the time they are gimmicky tricks that fade with time.
There are some incredible ideas in that article though.
Writing skills are probably the #1 thing people need to improve their traffic and sales numbers.
Better writing = more money
- Longer time on page
- Better ranking
- More clicks
- More sales
- More money in your pocket
Only 50% of the world has internet access right now.
Only 20% of the world population shops online.
The internet is a growth industry.
Now is a great time to position yourself to ride the trend in future years.
Don’t EVER think you missed the boat.
Now is a great time to start building your online business skills.
I talked a lot about how valuable writing can be.
Well, guess what: You can leverage it on your own website!
Or you can get paid to work on someone else’s.
Online content is not going anywhere soon.
People will not stop reading articles online (in our lifetime).
Learning how to write engaging content is an investment in yourself and your “skill stack”
Part of that skill stack is also knowing how to be a good copywriter.
Copywriting, is basically writing content to sell stuff.
This is the type of language you’ll use on your main “money pages”
A blog post titled “Product X Review” is not copywriting.
You’re just using natural language to talk honestly about a product. (write product reviews for affiliate sales)
If you are doing more of a “hard sell”, that’s copywriting.
My post titled How To Pick A Good Domain Name is NOT copywriting.
That’s a tutorial, showing information.
My email opt in page is a better example of what copywriting is.
The sole purpose of that page is to collect emails.
As I mentioned last week, copywriters can make bank.
Here’s a basic intro to copywriting and what it entails.
Keep reading for free tips I’ve learned from courses I’ve taken as well as my own personal experiences.
Copywriting Tip #1
Now I want to give you an idea of how powerful copywriting can be.
There are plenty of simple concepts to keep in mind as you write.
This is stuff that will transform you from “wannabe blogger” to “business owner”
Learning to sell results instead of features is an easy one to remember.
For example, I promoted “Optin Monster” to my emali list.
(It’s a lead-capture plugin service that works with your autoresponder)
One thing it can do is A/B test forms.
For example,, compete Version 1 against Version 2 to see which one performs better.
A less-effective promotion says:
Optin Monster can split test forms to see which one performs better
A more-effective promotion says:
Optin Monster can split test forms to increase your opt-in rate.
Another variation could be:
I used Optin Monster A/B testing to increase my opt in rate by 50% in less than one week.
See how the latter to focus on the RESULTS.
Looking at features describes the product accurately.
Looking at results creates a picture in the readers mind of what can happen.
When a dude buys a leather jacket, he doesn’t think “This will keep me warm when necessary.”
He thinks, “A bunch of hot chicks will like me better”
When you buy waterproof boots from the store, your thought isn’t just “I need these”.
Your thought is, “I’m going to be so much more comfortable without wet toes while I’m working”.
Copywriting Tip #2
I’m so dumb I basically robbed myself.
I’m the type of person that likes to joke about my mistakes rather than brag about my successes.
One of my favorite stories to tell still makes me embarrassed today.
I don’t know why I love to tell it.
Maybe it’s just because it’s funny what a dummy I was in my youth.
Or maybe there is some deeper meaning about human nature.
Back in 2013 I was living in Prague, in the Czech Republic.
At some point I bought a concert ticket in a neighboring city called Brno.
I was too cheap to buy a hotel, so instead of staying the night, I got a 2AM train back when the concert ended.
It was summer and the weekend, so it wasn’t a big deal.
On my way back, I discovered that my normal tram stopped it’s run for the night.
I decided to walk home through the city center (Prague is beautiful!).
On my way, a guy and his girlfriend stopped me.
They seemed lost. Tourists?
They were Czech, but not from Prague.
I gave them directions, but they still wanted to chat about the USA.
They loved it, and wanted to know more about my life.
We sat down on a bench and chatted for like 20 minutes.
Then they brought out a box of wine.
We sat drinking and chatting for a while.
Then they asked if I had any American dollars they could see or trade for Czech money.
Sorry guys, I’ve been here a while. Just Czech money in my wallet
“Can we see it?”.
Um, that’s a bit weird, but whatever.
These seemed like nice people.
So I pulled out my wallet.
“Can we hold it?”
Also weird. But whatever. OK.
So I put the money in the guys hand.
He put it straight in his pocket.
I laughed and said, Good one! Haha. Can I have my money back now?
“What money?” they asked.
Haha. Super funny guys. Seriously. I need that money.
Then they got up, and walked away.
There was no one on the streets to hear me yelling at them as they laughed, walking away.
/ / / / /
Stories are a way to capture people’s attention.
It keep them on the page longer, and helps them relate to you in some way.
Copywriting Tip #3
I think we all hate this one, but it works: Scarcity.
Making things scarce means people want them more.
On 12 copies? Dang, I want one.
Sale ends midnight?
I wasn’t sure I needed a leaf blower, but this could be my last chance to get a discount. I’ll buy it now, and use it later 🙂
Unfortunately, many “gurus” abuse scarcity. For example, they make fake countdown clocks.
The key to not be sleazy about your scarcity strategy is to be honest.
If you say you will only sell 12 copies, don’t sell 13.
How can you incorporate scarcity with affiliate marketing?
You can’t force companies to run discounts or limit sales.
An easy trick is to add a bonus!
Buy this home wet bar kit and get my 50 Weird Cocktail Recipes book for free.
I’m only giving away copies until Sunday @ 12am
Then I’m going to start selling the guide on Amazon for $9.99
People WILL spend $100 to save $10.
(by the way, the ADDED VALUE BONUS is a great tactic to increase sales)
Copywriting Tip #4
Write like you talk.
Lots of people are afraid to write because they aren’t good at it.
I say BS.
Nobody is bored and picks up an encyclopedia.
They scroll Twitter.
The look at memes on Instagram
They talk trash on Facebook.
That’s what people love to read.
Make your content relatable.
People don’t care if you have perfect grammar.
Sometimes, great grammar is annoying.
What’s more likely to get a response from general internet folk?
Please respond with your inquiries! VS Lemme know what you think!
Wanna know what I think?
#2 obviously.
You CAN cross a line with this.
For example, sometimes I sub to “gurus” just to see what they’re doing.
Right now I get emails from this one travel blogger who’s constantly blabbing about how much coke he does.
Bleh. Ok man. We get it. You’re a cool dude.
What’s the point of your email?
So you do need a balance between professionalism/helpfulness and being a real person.
What’s the right balance?
Only you can know the right structure for your audience.
Maybe the coke-guy’s emails work with his bro-audience.
For me, it’s a little too try-hard, and a turnoff.
That’s why it’s important to figure out WHO your audience is when picking a niche.
Final Thoughts
We covered a lot in this post, including how much writers make, how profitable it can be to stack writing skills, and some basic copywriting tips you can use for your own websites, or when writing for others. There are lots of helpful links to more resources regarding SEO, basic writing skills, and how to build a website, so follow up with those links to find the area you are most interested in!
Nathaniell
What's up ladies and dudes! Great to finally meet you, and I hope you enjoyed this post. My name is Nathaniell and I'm the owner of One More Cup of Coffee. I started my first online business in 2010 promoting computer software and now I help newbies start their own businesses. Sign up for my #1 recommended training course and learn how to start your business for FREE!
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