BreakingOut.NET has now been online a full year
Looking back it’s been quite an experience.
Things are still developing and taking shape for me in my own breaking out entrepreneurial adventure.
Let’s just wind the clock back to the spring of last year…
I’d just finished working as a freelance IT contractor with a large multinational in Brussels.
Just over a year before that I’d moved from Germany to Belgium after a break travelling in the Far East. I’d had enough of being a salaried employee treading the nine to five and so I decided to get back into contracting again.
Insanity: “doing the same things over and over, expecting a different result each time”
Prior to my last salaried job I was for many years a self employed contractor in Germany. I realised that although contracting to me was better than being a salaryman, this was no longer really what I wanted either.
Being a contractor in IT earns you pretty good money and you get to work in a variety of environments. Although I’ve come to realise that most of these environments are basically much of a much-ness.
Whether you work for these big companies on a salaried basis or as a contractor, it’s all basically the same stuff. Big bureaucratic corporations where you find yourself sitting next to drones who live for nothing more than their pay cheques, weekends and vacation. It’s just not for me anymore – if it ever was. I should have known better given my ample experience with it in the past.
So at the beginning of last year I decided to take a break before going any further in any direction and think things over.
Enter Steve Pavlina
The more I thought things over, the more I realised I was on the wrong path. Like that famous saying “insanity is doing the same things over and over again and expecting a different result each time”, or something. This had to stop!
It was at this time I came across a personal motivation and self-help guy called Steve Pavlina. He and his site looked interesting. Similar to me, he was also a kind of refugee from the IT world, having once run a software business in the past and had then turned to online media and web business.
I found his outlook very inspiring. It led me to question many things I’d only vaguely been aware of in the past. I’d always told myself to be “realistic” and then ignored and put away these issues in the attic of my mind. Out of sight and out of mind.
I realized it was high time to stop putting up with a situation that didn’t suit me. Instead I had to take the time and make the effort to identify and do the things in life that really did resonate with me. Stop putting up with second best.
At that moment I wasn’t sure exactly what this could be. I only knew it would be some form of business activity, probably some kind of online business or online media activity.
“I Quit!”
It was like the situation Sean Ogle at Location180.com was faced with when he was in the process of breaking out. He too was someone who knew he had to quit the corporate nine to five, but who at the time didn’t know exactly what the alternative would be.
Like Sean, of one thing I was certain – I was through with the big corporate nine-to-five of the past. No more of it for me. So this then was the first step.
I become a niche blogger…
At the same time I came across the website called entrepreneurs-journey.com run by an Australian blogger called Yaro Starak. His site was about blogging and online entrepreneurship – and this was something that I could relate to.
I realized there was a market for niche blogging. And so I decided this would be where I would start: becoming a niche blogger. I chose the travel and migration niche and I set up a couple of sites in these niches within a short time.
Through Yaro, I discovered another Australian – Ed Dale, of the Challenge Course which provides training for people who want to enter the niche blogging sector. I did this course and set up a couple more sites as a result and gained a better insight into the process. The Challenge served as my “101 training” in online niche marketing and blogging at this time.
I tried out some more courses after this, some more useful than others, before joining a course called Super Fast Results. This is an Internet Marketing training programme run by another Australian called James Schramko. Which is where I am today. So that’s the training and education side taken care of.
Running my handful of sites as it was by this time, I found I enjoyed blogging, so that wasn’t a problem. The harder nut to crack was e-commerce, affiliate sales, web marketing and all that, so the training programmes have really been useful here.
BreakingOut.NET was an afterthought
About 6 months on from this, I launched another site – BreakingOut.NET. At the time it was nothing more than a back burner project.
Correction: a back burner project that wasn’t even lit. It was just something I thought might turn into something later on. In the meantime I saw it as a loose blog to accompany my own online entrepreneurial adventures. Also maybe as a kind of repository of the resources and ideas I came across along the way – and which might also be useful to others in a similar situation.
The future turns out different to how I imagined it
Since then, things have been moving in a different direction to where I thought they would move a year ago. It’s now less about blogging and more about web marketing. I’m setting up a business providing web services and web marketing consultancy and this is where the main thrust of my activity is right now. The niche sites are still part of my activity, but they are not at the forefront.
It’s amazing how much I’ve learned and how much ground I’ve covered in just a year or so. I’ve learned things that I never even knew about before then.
There’s a lot more still to learn and put into practice. It’s been a great journey so far and for the first time in years, I feel like I’m in charge of my life and doing what I really want – and not what other people want.
Being firm with the “Negs”
On the latter point, I’ve had to cool or even cut contact, at least for the time being, with some people who were a negative influence in this respect. It’s a bit harsh perhaps, but on one issue I’m absolutely immovable. I can’t allow negs or “Jeremiahs” to disrupt or spread their negative influence on me and my business activities at any price.
That is a definite no-no and my business activities and dedication to it is a firmly red-lined no-go zone for them.
At least I’m not alone in this: I know many other people have had similar experiences with other people’s negativity and have also had to take similar action in this respect.
BreakingOut.NET has since taken shape
In the meantime, BreakingOut.NET too has changed. Initially the site was haphazard in content and focus as well as design and appearance-wise.
It’s still evolving now, but things have started to take better shape. I’ve also cut down the number of sites I maintain on the blogging front, which has made things easier.
As a result, BreakingOut.NET now serves as my main blogging site on the subject of online entrepreneurship and my own breaking out adventure in particular.
In Celebration – A Free Gift for my Readers!
Anyway, as a little celebration of the first full one year online for BreakingOut.NET, I’m offering all my readers a free gift.
An eGuide I wrote about the process of launching a website as an online business.
It’s called “Launch Your Own Website” and it’s based on my own practical experiences. I put it together from a series of posts I wrote for BreakingOut.NET earlier this year.
I’ve since revised, updated and expanded the material nd it now contains some 46 pages of useful know-how on the subject of building your own website.
If you’re interested in also launching your own website and you’re looking for an up-to-date eGuide to guide you through the steps, then “Launch Your Own Website” could be just what you’re looking for.
And it could also change your life. It’s certainly changing mine…
I’m making “Launch Your Own Website” available for download FREE to all my readers via the sign up box on the right-hand side of the front page. I’m also going to be mailing my subscribers once a fortnight with a handy update of all the latest new posts that appear on BreakingOut.NET.
So: Happy First Birthday to BreakingOut.NET – and Thanks to All My Readers, Subscribers and Supporters.
Here’s to the Coming Year of Online Success and Breaking Out for Everyone!
Kevin
PS. By the way, if you’re also interested in James Schramko‘s training course “Super Fast Results” you can check it out here. James provides a free one month trial for every newcomer. In my opinion this programme is one of the best out there and well worth it if you’re at all interested and serious about starting an online business.
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Image: 1st Birthday Cake- courtesy of nubobo
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Written by kevin
Topics: Kev's Diary