Pixel Sites...everyone's jumping on the band wagon
Not a day goes by when I don't get an email or see a site pushing yet another pixel advertising site but are these really a good advertising venue or is everyone just jumping on the band wagon expecting to make a few quick bucks or even get rich.
A search on Google for pixel sites gives 22,7000 results. The rage started when a 21 year old from England launched an advertising site where you paid $1 per pixel of advertising and the page was divided into 1,000,000 pixels. The advertising sold out and the guy made a cool million dollars! And get this the last remaining 1000 pixels were sold on ebay for a staggering $38,100!
The original site - The Million Dollar Homepage was launched on 26th August 2005. The guy then emailed all his friends and told them to pass on details of his site to their friends and so on...and then he sold his first 400 pixels for $400. At this stage the site was getting around 100 hits a day so he started to contact the press. An IT news site picked it up and ran an article resulting in 2000 hits an hour, it got ranked by Google and the hits went up to 35,000 a day.
And as the ball started rolling the visitors to the site increased, more pixels were sold, the guy made more money and the press interest increased. The site was getting over 100,000 unique visitors in 2 days and the UK nationals ran stories on the site. Then the story found its way into US papers, TV appearances followed and so on....publicity generates publicity. The site was getting hundreds of thousands of unique visitors and advertisers were seeing a good click through rate for their adverts.
Further TV interviews and radio interviews followed, Reuters ran an article on the site, as did the Wall Street Journal. With the last few remaining pixels auctioned on eBay the guy made is million dollars on 11th January 2006 - less of course any costs he incurred.
And then of course, the site was hacked and money demanded (which the FBI are currently investigating) but even this led to more media interest.
By the end of October 2005 hundreds of copy cat sites had started to spring up. Now there are thousands of them if not more. Have you visited any of these - most have no adverts on them, no traffic and no one in their right mind would choose to advertise on them.
So why have thousands of others thought they could hop on the bandwagon and make a quick $1,000,000? This guy had an unprecedented level of media attention, driving thousands and thousands of visitors to the site.
Even the guy behind the Million Dollar Home Page pixel site acknowledges that it is not a lasting business idea but a novel one off idea. There is no long term business concept and it will only work once. How long it will take those jumping on the pixel bandwagon to realise this - who knows!
Rachel Gawith runs her own home based business website which recommends a good online business, has ebook reviews, software reviews, resource reviews, an article dircectory, link exchange and free classified site. Pop over and have a look at www.computerincome.net
Starting A Home-Based Business
There are numerous reasons why people choose to start ahome-based business. Some of those reasons include:1. Dissatisfied with their present employment situation.2. Out of work due to being laid off or downsizing by theiremployer.3. A need to be home more with young children, an infirm familymember, or aging parents.4. A yearning to be their own boss.Whatever your particular reason for exploring a home-basedbusiness, there are a few common steps you need to take in orderto launch your business.First off, you need to come to grips with reality...be realisticin your expectations. Far too many folks read advertisementsthat are hype and imply quick money, and lots of it, from ahome-based business start-up. It will certainly take a year, andin some cases it may take up to three years, before you begin totruly make a significant profit from your business.I have helped a large number of people start up their ownhome-based businesses using the Internet. Over time, I have cometo recognize two of the most important factors for identifyingpeople that should NOT start a home based business. If aprospective entrepreneur says something like..."I'm broke and need to make some money, fast!"or,"I want to start a home-based business, but I don't want to spendanything on it until after I start earning some money."...it is certain that they have not addressed reality and, withthat mindset, they will most certainly fail.It takes a lot of time to successfully market and promote a newbusiness. If you are planning a home-based business in order tospend a lot of time with young children or care for the elderly, afull-time business (and income) may not be a realistic objective.Second, spend some time researching your business idea. Make surethere is truly enough of a market for your product or service.It's easy to fall into the trap of having a hobby or passion forsomething that you like to do and just assuming that you can turnit into an economically viable business.Third, learn as much as you can about small business. There is awealth of information available on this topic and the US SmallBusiness Administration is probably as good a place to start asany. Just go to http://www.sba.gov/ and navigate to the sectionsdealing with home based businesses.Fourth, write a business plan. It is your roadmap to reachingyour objectives. There are numerous articles on the Internetand in libraries that can assist you in developing your businessplan as well as addressing the many other issues involved withstarting and operating a business from home. As a startingpoint, here are a couple of Small Business Administrationwebsite locations that should prove useful:http://www.sba.gov/starting/indexbusplans.htmlhttp://www.sba.gov/library/pubs.htmlAnd last, but not least, seek the advice of a tax professional.Your first reaction may be that you can't afford such expensesright now; but, in reality, you can't afford not to seek suchadvice from the very beginning of your home business start-up.They can advise you about ways you may be able to reduce theamount of taxable business income at the end of the year.Paying for an hour or two of consultation with a tax professionalat the beginning will probably save you much more than thatamount later on down the road.I never cease to be amazed at the number of people that seem tothink that some magic is somehow created when you put the words"home based" in front of the word "business". It's stillbusiness...it just happens to be based in the home.-----------------------------------------------------------------Kirk Bannerman operates a successful home based business andresides in California. For more details, visit his website athttp://business-at-home.us-----------------------------------------------------------------
Quick, Easy Money...And Horse Feathers
Enter the horse feathers.Does it ever end? I've been involved with Internet-based homebusinesses for some time and I continue to be exposed to aseemingly endless barrage of offers (all costing me money, ofcourse) claiming to be "the secret" for making a fantasticincome, in a very short time, and with very little effortinvolved.I must admit that I may have a slightly self-serving reason foraddressing this topic. My articles are published on myhome-based business websites for the purpose of trying to giveprospective team members a true sense of what is really involvedwith starting and developing a successful home based business.The self-serving part, I suppose, is that I want people joiningmy team to have the straight scoop going in so that we don'twaste each other's time. I admit to being selfish in thisregard (I don't want to waste time working with people that haveunrealistic expectations), but it is also very efficient forboth parties involved, so it is not a totally one-way thing.Now, back to the topic at hand. There's no magic here, folks.Once you have selected the home business that you are going topursue, there are no substitutes for time and effort indeveloping your business. A dream of being an "overnightsuccess" is just that, a dream.I can tell you from personal experience, that once you "pay yourdues" and begin to have real success with a home based business,it is really terrific. Think about Nirvana or Valhalla, takeyour pick, but in any event it's really sweet.When I started developing a home based business, making a goodincome was obviously an objective, but I also had othersub-objectives. One of the most important things was to havenearly total time flexibility (I mean, if I was willing tocontinue to wear the 9-5 Mon-Fri collar I could just have juststayed in the previously "traditional" work force).Time flexibility was (and still is) a "biggie" for me. Manypeople working at home have the same need for various reasons.For work at home moms, a home business can be a real godsend toaccommodate the hectic time pressures, particularly when the kidsare quite young and mom is also spelled "transportation".In my own particular case, the reason is not quite so noble...Ijust want (need?) to be able to pick up my fly rod and go fishingat a moments notice (sometimes I'll be gone for a week or two ata time, but now the business has enough momentum that it keeps onoperating just as well as if I were here tending to it on adaily basis).Bear in mind, I am only able do the breakaway thing now that Ihave put in all the up-front time and effort and now havedeveloped enough kinetic energy in my home-based Internetbusiness to be able to enjoy the fruits of my labor.-----------------------------------------------------------------Kirk Bannerman operates a successful home based business andresides in California. For more details, visit his website athttp://business-at-home.us-----------------------------------------------------------------
