Internet Marketing Journal

I think it’s funny how these were once suppose to be “daily” videos where I would post an update every day about my journey to becoming an internet marketer.

I don’t know what I was thinking!!

There’s no way I can keep up with doing daily videos on top of everything else, and now when I look at this huge gap between my last post till this one…several months have gone by. Lol

Seriously though, I do intend to keep updates on how I’m progressing but I think they’re going to be just updates. I can’t keep up with constant daily videos (like I once insanely thought) so I guess I’ll just try to post whenever I can.

Anyway, since the last update I have been extremely busy online and offline. I reshot all of the Beginners Blueprint videos and also added a year of video newsletters that I’m giving away to my list subscribers. I’m extremely proud of all these videos and I’ve put a lot of work into them. I recently started a Facebook fan page (which was a learning curve) and I’m still trying to learn all I can about how to properly use Facebook to socialize and help my business. I also just recently lost my job because the company I worked 11 years for ran out of money to keep in going and had to close their doors. This alone has force me to really push myself harder than ever.

So it’s been a busy and stressful last few months, but I’m pretty good at finding the positives in everything.

I’ve recently decided to use a white background for some of my videos to help speed up the time it takes to shoot. I figured by setting up an area with lights and so on, then it will make it a little quicker to jump in front of the camera and start shooting. Although I don’t want to use every video with the same background so I’ll continue to mix things up but at least this gives me one more option.

I’M FREAKISHLY TAN! Lol
Well I’m still fascinated about these new lights and I’ve been taking lot of test footage throughout my house. On video my house seems to look really dark and digital cameras suck the light out of every room, so by using good lighting it feels like I have all whole new equipment. Final Cut Pro has been my best friend and I’m having a good time messing with the color and trying out a few things. I think I went a little overboard on the color in the last couple of Internet marketing journal videos, but that’s fine I’m having fun playing with it.

I haven’t used Final Cut in such a long time, and even then I only used it for offline work, so I’ve been finding myself watching a lot of youtube videos and getting ideas from others. There have been a few people that have really helped me out a lot, but no one has taught me so much with not only Final Cut but also with DSLR cameras, than Dave Dugdale. Dave makes amazing videos on using DSLR cameras and I like how he’s passionate about his work and constantly tries new things. He’s been a tremendous help.

I finally have the right kind of light and it’s amazing how much of a difference it makes. For the longest time I’ve been messing with the color and clarity of my videos in editing and it has taken such a long time to get a really good picture. But now with these new lights everything seems to come in a lot quicker. I’ve been studying a lot about lights lately and I’m finding out that the color temperature of bulbs will change based on what what the numbers are. Daylight color is about 5500k while normal household lights are around 2700k. I’ve never really looked at those numbers before, I’ve bought lights that said they produced natural sunlight and things like that but they always had a bluish tint to them. Now I’m finding out that it’s all up to the temperature numbers. Interesting stuff but a lot of details if you’re a beginner… that might even be a niche in itself? Hmmm, how to get proper lighting…

I took the family on vacation to beautiful Florida for the week and it was amazing!! It’s tough coming back to Kansas and my job but at least it helped me recharge. It’s good to get away sometimes and and destress a little.

During this last week I’ve began to really interact with the community through comments on other peoples blogs and Youtube. I’m starting to get a lot of view on my videos and more and more emails are coming in. I haven’t really done any type of advertising at all, just mostly pumping out content and trying to keep my Youtube channel as active as possible and it didn’t seem to take long to get noticed. I’ve even got a few subscribers and a couple of friends…not to bad for not doing anything to gain attention.

But things are different in that area now and I’m finding it real fun to leave comments and and ask questions to other Youtubers. Oh, and I have a set of pro lights on order and they should be here tomorrow. I’m really excited! I was spending so much time trying to get good light and then color correcting afterward and it was taking up too much time.

Well I’m a little disappointed in myself this week. I’m suppose to be adding 3 videos a week to my Blog so I can keep a steady amount of content going but I fell short this week and I only released one.

Just one!!

I’m so mad at myself! I only have 2 days a week to shoot videos (and pretty much do everything else) but I really need to find a better way to make my work more productive. Every time I hit a rode bump I like to step back and try to figure out how I can be more efficient, but the only thing I’m coming up with so far is wishing there were more hours in a day.

I really need to take a little time to think about this… how can I get the most out of 15 hours a week?

Charles

(oh I almost forgot. I only got two videos shot this week but I later found out that I was too close to the camera for one of the videos so now it looks like I’ll only have 1 to release. Very frustrating.)

Stepping in front of the camera is not an easy thing in the beginning, in fact it’s a little scary, but now I’m facing a new problem…the elderly who like to feed squirrels. Just kidding. I’m having a great time and I’m constantly active, even when I’m not physically working it seems that my mind continues to keep going. Since I just started this new schedule I’m still trying to fine tune ways to make every minute I have to be more productive, but until then I’m just shooting videos and taking notes like crazy. I should be out there publicizing more and spreading out my efforts and it seems like time management needs to really be assessed right now.

As I’ve said before, internet marketing is tough but it becomes even more difficult when you try to create your online business with a family. Finding time to sit down uninterrupted and really work is not always as easy as it may seem when you have children running around or hundreds of daily events that need attended to. I’ve been patiently waiting and franticly looking for any openings and after a grueling wait, I’m now able to devote 15 solid hours a week to working online. I’m excited to get started and I hope for a speedy journey even though I know a good business takes time.

While I’ve been sitting stagnent these last several weeks, trying to find a solution for how and when to shoot more video, I decided to tweek several little areas of the websites. One of the things I noticed was that I was having a problem with my videos not playing or not even showing up on my main Blog site when I used a mobile device. Maybe it’s just my phone, I don’t know, but I still think it’s important to fix this.

When I set up all three websites I added a video plugin to each blog so I could add video a lot easier. I really like the creative control that these plugins give me but I never realized it would have an impact on mobile devices. I’m sure in the furture plugins will become more compatable, but as for right now I’m facing a problem with 98% of the content on my sites. Since I use video to deliver the majority of my content, I need to make sure that mobile users can also access my content without any issues… but I do have a simple soultion. It seems that Youtube videos play without problems so what I need to do is disable the plugin then go through every single video on my sites and embed the actual code for the Youtube video. This seems like the easiest way to ensure others can view my videos on mobile devices and I’ll just have to use the standard video player that Youtube provides.

It won’t be fun going through every single video and changing them but I’m glad I realized this now instead of finding out a couple hundred videos down the road.

Charles

**UPDATE**: A new firmware update was finally released for my phone and once I installed the upgrade, all of my videos began to work normally (even the ones using the plugin). So it seems it was a firmware issue with my phone and not necessarily the plugins. But since Youtube will always stay compatible with everyone I think it’s still a safe bet to just stick with using Youtube to embed the videos. I also noticed that JW Player and other video players worked fine as well, so maybe if I decide to “pretty up” the skins on the video player I’ll probably consider using something in that area.

Since I’ve begun this Internet Marketing journey I’ve had to overcome a lot of obstacles. I gave up my office to make room for a nursery. I set up my studio in the dinning room and lost all quiet and privacy. I altered my working schedule in order to find feasible time to shoot video and add content ( 9pm-1am nightly). I’ve sacrificed sleep in order to keep being productive (between 4-5 hours a night). Then I gave up my only working hours so I could be in bed with my wife every night, and now after completely finishing 3 fully functional websites I’m ready to do nothing but shot video and add content. Only now, I have another obstacle.

Since I no longer have a separate room to set up my studio in, and since I’m not able to quit my 9-5 job, I don’t have any alone time to shoot video. With being at work all day and a house full of kids all night, it has become completely impossible to set up the video camera and lighting and shot a professional video without interruption. So that means that I’m at a standstill, and I have been watching each day go by and searching my brain for an answer. I’m off work on Thursdays and Fridays so it looks like my only option is take the kids to daycare all day and pump out some productive work, but I hate to lose that quality one on one time with them.

Starting an online business is hard enough but being faced with a decision like this makes it even harder, but I guess it’s a small sacrifice that needs to be made in order to build a better future for our family.