It's been a month since I joined WA. This one month experience has been very exciting yet challenging. I started out with great enthusiasm, reading and trying to put into practice everything I read. 

But even so, it has been very hard to overcome the roadblocks I have met on my IM journey. What I have learned in this first month is DON'T BE AFRAID TO ASK FOR HELP.

I have spent the entire month working about 8 to 12 hrs daily. My husband thinks I am going nuts with this IM thing. He does not believe in my cause and that makes me even more eager to prove him wrong. But he pays for my training anyway just to keep me happy and not bored since I have no job.

Many times I have been discouraged and felt like giving up. Thinking to myself, no I can't do it. I am not smart like everyone else here.

I was afraid to bother anyone with my stupid questions(how to set up a free wordpress blog for example). I think it should be easy so people might feel I am stupid. haha. I know no question is stupid. That is just me. So I asked a few questions but then tried doing the rest by myself.

Well I got some help, fixed my blogs best I could. Wrote about 20 or more articles to EZA then stopped there.

 I felt stuck and did not know how to proceed. No sales. Lots of clicks but no sales. After a month and feeling like I am just wasting my time. I decided to heed Potpie girls words which have stuck with me. If You are willing to do for a day what others won't, then you can spend a life time doing what the can't.

Not sure if I quoted it correctly but heck you get the point.

I thus decided to slow down a little so as to avoid being sick because I was really stressing myself up with the whole thing.

It then occured to me to choose two people I could approach and ask for their personal help. Sometimes asking questions on the forum will get you help but if you approach people personally, you are surer to get even more help.

And thankfully, people here are always more than willing to give you the help you need.

Reading all the stuff here frightens me at times. I ask myself, wow, when will I ever grasp all this.

I decided to start with Article Marketing so to keep myself from being overwhelmed, that is what I concentrate on and try to ask all the questions I possibly can.

I have not read the ppc and creating a website and all that yet because I do not feel ready for that yet. I prefer to grasp one concept first before going to another.

I love thinsg simple because I can understand better and it keeps me from being confused.

Also because I live in Asia and don't have access to a credit card or paypal it's not easy for me to buy stuff online, so I must do the best I can to use all free methods available to me.

At the same time I am looking into getting a paypal account that can work for me in China. Not easy though but I know I need it badly and I am working on it.

However, I will not let that deter me, I will keep learning and applying all I can with what is availaible for me to use.

One of the problems I have encouneterd in this journey is that I feel so confused at times as to how all this works.

Thanks to reading a lot from Potpie girl and Travis I am learning to keep things simple.

So my plan of action now is this.

Find a niche,

Find a product that meets the need in that niche

Create a free landing page

Write and deposit articles to EZA

create back links.

This plan looks easy but to me it has been hard to understand how all this works.

Well though I have not made any sales yet, I have stopped to look at what I have achieved in this one month so I can give myself  pat on the back.

It may not be much to most of you but to me it is a lot. When I first started out I had no clue about anything.

Now I know how to

find a niche with high demand and low supply( at least I understand the basics)

find a relevant product using the clickbank tool

create a landing page on weebly and blogger( wow, these gave me so much stress at the beginning. See I have made progress.Haha

But I am told wordpress is better so I am learning how to do that.

Still have a lot of problems with adding ebook covers and affiliate links on wordpress .Also do not even know what a permalink is and how to get my links to redirect to a product page. They always just redirect to the wordpress blog again. Haha.

I have also learned how to write good articles, write good headlines and write a good resource box.

I have learned how to make all these relevant to my landing page and product.

Still need to learn more about creating back links.

Hell I do not understand anything about digg or stumble upon or delicious and how to use these. I have signed up accounts but that is all I know how to do.

I have learned how to  use EZA as several times I have had my account blocked for submitting an article to EZA which I also submitted to hubpages but forgot to write my name on. Right now my EZA account is blocked but well, I hope it gets resolved soon.

I have heard about Goarticles but they do not accept web based email addresses. I don't yet know how to create a non web based email address so I can start submitting to goarticles.

I have to make a list of 10 article submitting services where I can submit my articles for more back links.

I find hubpages does not do me much good because of their no follow rules and my articles in articlesbase do not get many views. Only EZA has satisfied me so far. I need to look for others as I plan to drop hubpages.

Wow, this has been a long post but pouring out myself feels good.

One piece of advice I will leave with all IM newbies like me.

If you feel overwhelmed, tired and exhausted you might easily give up. If you feel frustrated and feel like you aren't making progress, try documenting the little successes like I have done. Celebrate each one because these make up great successes.

Lastly, give yourself time to rest. If you feel frustrated, take some time off your PC. Go out and have some fun. My hubby takes me to eat out and watch a movie and he gives me a back massage each night because siting long hours on my PC has been giving me lots of back and neck pain.

Once your energy is renewed you will be in a better position to resume your IM endeavors where you ended.

I know I still have a long loooonnnnnnnnnggggggg  way to go but looking back and seeing the little progress I have made gives me the courage to move on.

Thanks for reading.

Belated Happy New Year

Suzzy