House Remodeling - Upstairs Bathroom Before & After
Who would have thought that with a little help from a book my father bought us and phone help from both Jon’s dad and my own that we would be able to figure out how to tile floor, do plumbing as well as minor electrical work?
When we moved in, our bathroom was extremely outdated. One day last fall Jon was out doing yard work and I was brushing my teeth and looking at the shower behind me through the mirror and I decided to rip the entire thing out. I grabbed a hammer and tore out the entire plastic lining of the shower and tub, as well as all of the rotting drywall.
We installed wall tile and then we decided to rip out the floor and put a nice clean white tile down. The toilet for our bathroom had been leaking into the sub floor for who knows how long so we had to deal with removing rot and replacing the toilet seal while keeping the new tile and grout clean.
Finally it came down to the vanity and the mirror and lighting. We ripped out the old vanity and medicine cabinet and today finally finished replacing it with a nice modern sink and cabinet with BRIGHT lighting.
Had we paid somebody to do all of this for us, it would have cost about $2,500. Our total costs are around$700 because we did it ourselves.
Next is the downstairs bathroom which we are removing the tub and putting in a corner shower. That will be fun! Then the kitchen. Between this and our work it is keeping us really busy but I am not complaining.
Check out the photos of before and after… Please ignore the lack of completed paint. We are finishing that. Also replacing all of the light switches as well as re-glazing our bathtub so it is as white as white can get!
Change
Finally. We have a new president. What a great day and speech it was.
I am looking forward to what will come from having him elected.
This has been a crazy week. I have been catching up with ideas and work left over from Vegas and also finishing construction on the house. One of the bathrooms is done, i finished grouting it last night and it looks amazing. I will post some photos soon.
Today we had contractors rip out over 200 feet of old chain link fencing from our yard. Lowes is delivering our new 6 foot privacy fencing tonight (lots of it) in about 20 minutes and the contractors will start installation tomorrow. Really excited.
Not only will this increase out property value but it will make us happier. We love out massive yard and the pets will too.
While we are on the subject of change.. I decided that Legend needed his first hair cut today. He looks 20 pounds lighter. Pix below 
Affiliate Summit East 2009 - Las Vegas
We just got back from our first trip to Las Vegas, Nevada for Affiliate Summit 2009. Thank you much to Shawn Collins and Missy Ward for throwing yet another great event.
Overall I would have to say that the last day of the event was the most useful to me. I was able to actually get some alone time with a few of the people that I came to talk to and I made a few new connections.
Most disappointing was that we missed the first day on Sunday and by Monday, everybody was hungover and tired and all of the affiliate managers I was hoping to meet with and talk to were not in the right state of mind. For once, I did not go to the conference to party but to work.
Now that we are home, we are swamped with ideas and luckily I only have my business card out to about 10 people who I hope to speak with therefore limiting the number of harassing calls from networks trying to steal my business.
The event was great but I am not so sure about Vegas. I can say that I am not a fan and it is not what I expected. We had a blast hanging with Justin and Jonathan on Tuesday night and our hotel at the Venetian was beautiful.
See some of you at AdTech in April! Enjoy the photos from the Summit below.
New Update - Theme & More
Its been 1.5 years since I have updated my version of wordpress.
I have installed the moneymaker theme from the guys at uniqueblogdesigns.com and am going to be having it customized to the colors I like from my last blog, as well as some other neat things.
Seems everyone is changing their blogs so its about time i jumped on it.
Hopefully I can have it customized and my logo designed in time for ASW .
Affiliate Marketing Business - The Year For Me
This is my first post of 2009 so I figured that I would write about a priority goal this year and about mistakes I made last year and will never make again in this affiliate marketing industry.
2008 was the best year for me in this industry. Mostly from PPC. I discovered how to use contextual advertising to its best while spending small amounts in my CPC. I learned that if you are running on search and you NAIL a great ad copy, you will get a killer quality score and cheaper clicks and then you expand.
Up until about a month ago, I was using tracking software that someone had made for me when I started in the industry. It was custom, outdated but it had worked wonders for me while it lasted. Soon enough I bit the bullet and tried out Prosper202 because of all of the hype I heard. It is probably one of the best tools I have ever seen offered to affiliates for FREE. If you are an affiliate and you need good tracking then I suggest you install this tool. If you cannot figure out how to use prosper then you can use the Tracking202 for free as well. It is web based and so simple that any idiot could figure it out.
2008 was great for me but 2009 needs to be better. Affiliate Summit East is coming up this weekend in Las Vegas and Jon and I are excited to go. I need to expand on my ideas and meet some new people and make some new ideas. I will never discuss how much I earn per year, or how much I made last year but it was key to achieving every goal I had last year and to help me start my new ones this year.
I have been digging around with the idea of media buying. That is something that is in the works and it takes a chunk of change (minimum of 10k with many of the big wigs such as myspace). That is pocket change to some people I know in this industry and to others, its a gamble. My goal is to get this rolling while maintaining my PPC efforts and staying up to date with the newest info and software. I fell out of the loop in 2008 when I stopped being interactive with the forums and my friends in this industry. It was still a great year for me, but it could have been better if i figured out things like Prosper SOONER.
One key mistake I made in 2008 which I cannot express to people enough. If you are new in this industry then you need to make sure that you sign up with TRUSTED networks. Do some research before you go off throwing your money into a company that is going to screw you in the end. By screwing, I mean shaving leads, stealing your keywords and then “attemptin” to keep your money.
It happened to me with 2 networks in 2008. One is CJ as I wrote about earlier this year and the other I will not say because it was part of the deal in me getting paid. What happened was a great campaign popped up on the network. It was one that I had experience in with its niche so I knew I would kill it. I did amazing with it, about $30k in the few weeks it was active. Once day I was told that I needed to take down the site, stop promoting it, etc because I was bidding on keyword that the advertiser did not “like” (they had nothing to do with trademark). I took down the site and waited and to make a long story short, it took me 8 months to get my final payment.
The offer was pulled from the network because they did not comply with the advertisers rules OR put any of the TOS in the campaign for the affiliates to see. In turn, they tried to place blame on the affiliates and hold $$.
The worst part of all of this…. Which pisses me off to no end and I am sure it has happened to many other affiliates that I know… The keywords that were converting for me that the advertiser demand I stop promoting..
Since the very next day that I took down my site and stopped promoting with those keywords, THE ADVERTISER WHO ASKED ME TO STOP HAS BEEN BIDDING ON THOSE VERY KEYWORDS.
They stole from me. From my idea, unique. Its sad but it happens. Which is one point to everybody that you should mask your keywords so that nobody knows them but you.
It has been almost 3 years for me in this business. I love it. My goal is to keep at this in 2009 alongside the other business Jon and I plan on opening and make this a prosperous year. In my 3 years I have worked with probably over 20 networks and I have to say that out of all of them the people at Copeac and Advaliant have been the best. Danielle at Copeac and Alla from Advaliant have been amazing. All of the other employees inside their companies including Eddie from Copeac have been informative and helpful in getting me what I need when I need it instead of blowing me off like some other networks do. That is what being a real affiliate manager is all about.