How do I Make Money?
"Business opportunities are like buses, there's always another one coming."
— Richard Branson (1950-)
Living the Dream, but How Do I Make Money?
"The best way to make money is to put your nose down and get to work. You make money by making better decisions, and you make better decisions by learning and practicing. The more you know, the more you'll earn.."
— Warren Buffet (1930-)
I had just discovered how to be the best at acquiring domain names. I was quietly acquiring virtual real estate with great potential, amidst the Internet's implosion and the failure of dot-com ventures everywhere. The media said it was the 'death of the Internet ', and experts said no one would trust it or buy online anymore.
This was all music to my ears, as I imagined more people listening to the 'experts', giving up on their dreams of online fortunes and the domains connected to them.
It was a blessed opportunity I couldn't believe. It was a great reset. The Internet would crash 90% in the next year.
By Dec 2000, I had 300 domain names but $0 revenue from them. I wondered how these other domainers kept registering so many new domains and kept the flywheel turning with registrations on their existing portfolio needing to be renewed.
I would run out of money if I didn't learn how to make money from these assets.
Who is the Best I Can Learn From?
"What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us."
— Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)
There were a handful of domainers who stood out. One was Yun Ye, who went under the moniker "No Name or UltSearch." His specialty was registering great two-keyword domains. He registered hundreds each day, like clockwork. Next was Frank Schilling. Then Garry Chernoff. Mike Mann of BuyDomains was a reseller, a different model than Yun, Frank, and Garry.
When I went to Yun and Frank's domain web pages, they just had a bunch of links. I didn't understand how they made money. They used Goto.com search, which said they would pay 2-5 cents per search. This small amount wouldn't do much.
I looked up where Frank lived. White Rock, BC, Canada, is just an hour's drive away, so I emailed him to invite him to lunch in Richmond at Milestones. I was anxious, as I was an introvert and didn't know what to expect. I had a bunch of questions. He showed up. If you know Frank, you can immediately sense that he will do great things. He is super street smart, innovative, and a good reader of people.
I told him I was a medical doctor but couldn't turn down this opportunity to be part of this Internet revolution. Domain names seemed like a fantastic opportunity, but I didn't know how to make money.
He looked me in the eyes and asked, "How many unique do you get?"
Me: Uniques? What do you mean?
Frank: How many unique people come to your domains each day?
Me: I'm not sure. Well, I have 300 domains, so I'd say 8,000 daily uniques.
Frank: No way. I have been doing this for over a year and get 10,000 daily uniques.
Me: Well, I haven't actually turned on any of my domain names yet. I will do that and let you know.
I asked him how much money he made on those 10,000 uniques. He was silent. I asked for a hint. I quickly did some math: 10,000 uniques * 2 cents per search = $200/day. More than $200/day?
He was tight-lipped.
We finished our drinks (mine, non-alcoholic). I thanked Frank profusely and told him that I enjoyed meeting him. We became friends, and he became my hesitant mentor. It was just like the hospitals, where a resident learns from their seniors.
“See one. Do one. Teach one” was our method for training doctors. I would take this model into business to see what the best did, then try to emulate them. Then, I would try to ask them questions when I needed help understanding or getting stuck. Once I learned, I would return the favour to others who would ask me and try by doing. It was how the apprentices became masters in due time during the Renaissance.
I went home and started to turn on the domains. I had 300, so I quickly automated it by programming it with a script. But I couldn't find an analytic program to measure uniques across so many domains. I asked Frank how to do that. He told me to log the IPs of each visit. Each unique IP equalled a unique visitor. I figured out how to program that in a few days and then had my stats.
3,000 uniques. I was disappointed. I was expecting more. Now, I had a baseline. My domains were live, and I was just measuring traffic to each one of them.
How Much Money Can I Make?
"If you don't find a way to make money while you sleep, you will work until you die."
— Warren Buffett (1930-)
I invited Frank to a Chinese martial arts movie, Iron Monkey. We enjoyed that inspiring Shaolin kung fu, a metaphor for the discipline required to be guardians. We got to know each other. I made it a point not to ask any business questions but to bond with him. He later told me his wife Michelle asked him, "So what did he want?" he replied, "Oh, he just wanted to watch a movie with me."
I looked at Yun's and Frank's domains. Yun's portfolio was much larger, so I assumed he knew what he was doing and had a better monetization engine. He was with a 'pay-per-click search engine' called Findwhat, a platform that allows advertisers to bid on keywords and pay a fee each time their ad is clicked. Frank was with Goto. I signed up to Findwhat. I implemented their pay-per-click feed into each domain name. Voila.
I started making $300 per day. Wow, that would be close to $9k/month.
I achieved all this by getting Frank to be my mentor (and later great friend) and emulating Yun. Later, I learned Garry Chernoff had done this for Frank when he was starting. This is a secret to life: Help one another despite the up-and-comer being your competitor. It will all be a win-win in this abundant world.
Frank told me a hint: I could make a lot more. I pondered this. What did he mean? He then hinted that someone was making 10% on my domains. What? How could that be? I had asked FindWhat for a better revenue share, but they turned me down. I asked Dean, my account manager if someone was making money on my domains. David said, "Yes, David L, who referred you."
Me: I don't know any David L. Is this why I can't get an increase?
Dean: Yes.
I decided to sign up for Goto and spoke to Dan. He set me up quickly, and I swapped over my domains for a day as a test. I had thought it would do poorly and didn't want to sacrifice the revenue, but I wanted to test it.
Dan asked me, "Do you know how much you made that day?" $150? "No. $1500!" What? Really?
I was so shocked. I 5x’d my revenue overnight. I was so overjoyed.
Thank you, Frank. I love you! You've been such an amazing friend, through thick and thin, like a brother.
This changed everything. I was on a path to a million dollars. I was onto something big now. All that blood and sweat brought tears to my heart.
The Path to a Million Dollars a Year
"0 to a million is the hardest one. The next million is easier, and the next even easier.."
— Kevin Ham (1970- )
I asked myself the question when I finished my residency and did my significant career shift.
"How does one make a billion dollars?"
"How does one make a million dollars?"
I read Forbes and looked for a pattern. 470 billionaires.
They all seemed to excel at one thing amazingly well: investing in real estate, stocks, a great scalable business, or they were good at retaining and growing their inherited wealth.
I had a big insight. I could be a millionaire and possibly a billionaire if I excelled at one thing better than almost anyone else. Could I do that with domain names? Possibly.
If I wanted to make a million dollars in 10 years, I would only need to save $100,000 annually. Certainly doable, now that I had made two businesses generate 2x-3x that in a year.
What's my Compounding Flywheel?
$1 million a year broken down was:
$83,000/month
$2,777 per day
$116 per hour (just 10x the minimum wage)
I just had to double my current $1,500 per day. Wow! I'm halfway there. I 5x'd my revenue just by switching from FindWhat to Goto, and now I only have 2x to get to a million. This is totally doable.
Wow, the power of powerful partnerships. It seemed too easy.
It had taken me three months to register 300 domain names. I could see the pathway to double this, but now, equipped with metrics and a monetization engine, it could accelerate.
For the following 300 domains, I would target more traffic and relevancy for higher clicks and revenue per click.
This would be my flywheel and my focus. It became my driving obsession to be better than anyone in the domain world.
I would learn to compress and expand time to manage expectations and think outside the box.
Life Questions
"A wise person should have money in their head, but not in their heart."
— Jonathan Swift (1667-1745)
How do I make money doing what I love?
How do I accelerate with the right mentors?
How do I multiply with a few simple essential moves?
Life Advice Then
From my 29-year-old self:
"Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune."
— Jim Rohn (1930-2009)
Model and Befriend the Best in Your Field.
Find your mentor and master to apprentice you in ways you can't anticipate
Money is a result of providing value to your partners and others.
Someone needs you as much as you need them. Seek that vital partner.
You find success with just a few simple levers.
Life can change in an instant with one idea, one implementation, one partnership, one customer, and one metric.
Life Advice Now
From my 53-year-old self:
"It's fine to celebrate success, but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure."
— Bill Gates (1955-)
Be Grateful for the relationships you make during your journey.
These relationships are the most precious you gain. More than all the money in the world.
Enjoy the journey, the ups and also the big downs.
There is a meaningful lesson in every part of your journey.
Reflect more and write your reflections privately or publicly.
Others are seeking your learnings, and you pay forward the blessings you have been given, whether life deals you good or bad hands.
Next week: How to Turn Someone's Junk into Gold.
And your junk may be someone's gold. The best Win-Win!
See you next Thursday!
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