Pretty cool, been rockin to Wiz a lot lately…

Had a pretty good time in Tampa this week. Don’t feel like doing a long-winded post so I’ll just throw a few pics up:

^^Our super sick HHR rental car, which was drifted over every single square inch of Tampa and racked up some serious toll booth fees. Jon wasn’t used to handling something with this much power so I had to keep him under control.

^^Sunset from the hotel one night.

^^My badge for the conference, and potentially my new business card design lol. I didn’t take a pic of my buddy’s, but he was the “Chief of Leisure” over at OnlinePoker.org. Gonna try to post shorter updates more often now. Keep it bauss ya’ll.

Been a while since I posted (I feel like all my posts start with that, haha) so I decided to get on here for an update.

“Premium” Domains

First… what in the world is going on in the PAL marketplace? Has anyone else noticed the enormous number of domain sales, all of which are listed as “premiums” but are (for the most part) total garbage? I think all of the talk about exact match domains in the past few months has driven people to snatch up as many domains as they can with the intention to flip, but it’s getting a little late for that game. Nothing is left for reg. fees, and even finding a good domain for a fair price is getting pretty trick too. If you’re in the market for a domain, be wary and skeptical because a lot of people are trying to move mediocre domains for premium prices. There are a few good sales going at PAL, but for the most part the domains being sold are all but worthless.

Change of Pace

I sold my gambling network. That’s about all I can say about that

I’m already working on new projects (like Best Poker Sites and non-gaming stuff), but it’s certainly different to wake up with nothing to do, as opposed to having a blown up inbox, Skype, and huge to-do list. I like it though.

Tampa

Hollowtips and I are going down to a search/social conference down in Tampa next week, so if anyone is down there and wants to golf or just get dinner or whatev, hit me up.

I’ve recently been building some links for my BookMaker bonus code site, and posted an offer on PAL where I paid members and provided a BookMaker review if they would host it on their site permanently (with a link back to my site). I actually got way more responses then I thought I would, and some of them have been from great sites that I ended up working out a deal with, but some have been so bad it’s laughable.

Seriously, why would you waste your time building spammy poker blogs with two or three inbound links (where every post has outgoing links) then try to sell blog posts for $50 or $100 or whatever, and also sell twenty links in the blogroll section? No one in this business who makes real money does stuff like that… it is a total waste of time. Build real sites, build real links, and you’ll be making more per player than you used to make per site. If you’re set on running a blog, make a real blog like MeltedFelt where people will actually be interested in working with you. /EndRant

I had a pretty busy February so I didn’t get around to posting much, but here’s what I’ve been up to:

Travel

I decided to sit Spring Break out this year because of all the work stuff I’ve got going on in the next month or two. Taking a week or longer off to go party would set me way back, so I’m gonna hold off on that for a while. That being said, next week I’m going to Stratton in Vermont to snowboard for a couple days. I went there like five years ago and it was sick… way better than our local ski resort so I’m pumped to get up there and “shred the gnar”. Stay tuned for pics of me getting Shaun White air in the super pipe

I’m also headed down to North Carolina with my family some time in April, but besides those two trips I don’t have anything big on the horizon. Just enjoying myself in State College and hopefully getting a lot done.

Business

I stretched myself pretty thin business-wise in February, but I’m pumped for all the new projects I’ve got in the pipeline. I bought HoldemReview.com from one of my buddies, which is an awesome site that I’m hoping to push over the top in the next year or so. I also just re-launched InternetPoker.org and have been working on PokerRules.net, both of which are fairly new projects that probably need another month or two before they’ll be earners. The Internet Poker site isn’t really complete at the moment, but I wanted to get the new template up and start sorting out the redirects before I add a bunch of pages. The poker rules site is getting good traffic already, but I’m a little concerned with how the site will convert. If I can’t just push people to a poker site I’ve got a few other ideas to monetize the site that I’ll try out.

Besides new stuff, I’ve also been working on fine-tuning my main poker site a little bit as far as conversions go. I use CrazyEgg to do this stuff, and it seriously is the best $9 I spend every month. The original landing page I had set up was converting traffic to “money clicks” at a pretty low percentage, and after trying out five or six different ones I’ve found one that’s 200% better than the original. Obviously that is a significant increase in earnings for just a little bit of work and testing.

Moral of the story is test your pages because you’re probably “leaking” money somewhere

Over the last couple weeks I’ve been making a conscious effort to increase my productivity, and I’ve come up with a few ways to really help myself work more efficiently and for a longer time. I’m gonna try to stay away from the usual “make a vision board, use crazy Internet filters, handcuff yourself to your computer, etc”, because if you have to do that stuff you don’t have any motivation anyways. Here we go:

Productivity Tip #1 – Have Cold Water in the A.M.

Haha, seriously. I don’t know what it is, but for some reason if I have a cold bottle of water right when I wake up, I’m ready to get going and almost always am in the office within half an hour. If I don’t, I lay around for an hour doing nothing.

Productivity Tip #2 – Look Good = Work Good

Just like golf right? If I wake up, take a shower, and put on some nice clothes, I get a lot more done than if I just wake up and throw on some sweats.

Productivity Tip #3 – Make a DAILY To-Do List

On my computer I have a Word document with dozens of things that need to be done, but the first thing I always do every morning is write down exactly what I want to get done *today*. There are usually five to ten items on the list, and by doing this I force myself to be accountable for the day. Instead of saying “eh I knocked a few things off the list”, I can look at my daily list and see if it is done or not. Then I know if I’ve had a good day or if I need to work longer.

Productivity Tip #4 – Keep a Clean Workspace

Right now my apartment is a wreck, but my office is clean. That’s probably why I get 99% of my work done here. I can work much better with a little space and without clutter everywhere.

Productivity Tip #5 – Close the Email/Skype/AIM

This one is a pretty common tip, but the worst thing you can do for your productivity is to leave your Gmail inbox open, Skype chat online, and AIM buddy list up. It’s way too easy to respond to emails/chats as they come in and lose your focus when you could have handled all your emails at the end of your day.

Time to practice what I preach – working on my new online craps guide today.

Forgot the business cards for the third conference in a row, so here’s what I’m going out with tonight:

I’ll definitely be getting some fat CPAs with these bad boys.

I’ve spent the last week or so moving into a new office, which is right down the street from my apartment. I went back and forth a few times deciding if I actually needed the space, because I was working pretty well at the library every day. However, I finally caved in and got it, and I’m really glad I did.

After I moved in I went to a furniture store to get a desk and chair, and was kinda surprised by how much nice furniture costs. Example – the first desk and chair I liked cost like twenty grand, and I was not looking to drop five figures on a desk and chair haha. I ended up finding a nice setup in their warehouse that another customer had ordered but didn’t want, so it was discounted 80%.  Here is a picture of the desk/chair where I work:

I splurged on the chair but am glad I did – it is 1000x more comfortable than anything I’ve ever used, and when I spend a lot of my day in it I figured I should get a good one. I also got a couple leather guest chairs for when I have “meetings” AKA never.

And of course, since I’m a huge Don Draper fan I couldn’t do without the obligatory bar and bottle of Canadian Club:

The space I got actually has two rooms, and since I wasn’t using the other one Chuck is sub-leasing it from me to run his online agriculture/dating/lobster empire.

Ever since I moved in I’ve been way more productive and working more often as well. I’d highly recommend getting an office.

Tomorrow I’m off to London for a week or so for the LAC. Usually when I go to these conferences I sleep all day and party all night, but really don’t accomplish anything. This time around I’ve got some good meetings set up that I’m really looking forward to. If you’re over there, hit me up on Skype (michael.wittmeyer) because my cell won’t work.

Got home from Mexico Saturday and am back on the grind, finally. I pretty much took a month off of work so it feels good to be productive again. Here are a few pics from my Mexico trip:

Good view from our balcony

Sick sunset

We went to see a bullfight, which got pretty vicious. Not something to take a girl to.

at one point we hiked deep into the mountain to see a rain forest, and along the way we came across some random guy cooking food in the middle of the jungle lol. Chuck bought a plate of meat off him for like $2 or something crazy.

Me chuck and some natives climbing the waterfall. We didn’t take the cameras out much so most of the crazy stuff isn’t here, but to say the least it was a fun trip.

PokerSite.org

I also finally got the new version of PokerSite.org up AKA the “everyone else should quit poker affiliating” version . I’m still working through a lot of mistakes and issues with the transition, but let me know what you think of the site anyways, and link to the site if you like it!

I’ve had the new Macbook Pro for a couple weeks now and really love it. I don’t wanna be the stereotypical Windows-hater but I’m glad I switched, everything is a lot faster and works just like it’s supposed to. My favorite parts are definitely the insane battery life (like 4+ hours while listening to music and working), the fast boot-ups (like 12 seconds from off to on the Internet), and Garage Band (been having wayyy too much fun with that lol).

I haven’t really been up to anything exciting lately, just working on my sites, boxing, and sporadically learning the guitar. The PokerSite.org redesign is taking longer than I thought, but I should have it up before Christmas. I’m really excited to get it up and running because the site hasn’t had any attention in like six months and has been slipping up a bit lately.

I also am moving into an office sometime this week which I’m looking forward to. The last few weeks I’ve been working either at my apartment or at the local library, which isn’t bad but still isn’t great. The office is only a block or two down the street too, so pretty convenient.

Friday I’m headed home for Christmas, and then am off to Puerta Vallerta for a vacation with Chuck and a few other friends. I can’t even imagine the amount of debauchery that is gonna go down on this trip, but I’ll take lots of pics. Catch ya’ll later.