Need Some Personal Advice...

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scottspfd82

scottspfd82

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Dec 29, 2006
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This is going to be a long post. Any responses, flames, whatever are much appreciated.

Here's the thing, I know where I want to be in life, and I'm not there. Over the last year I was a pretty avid poker player and usually cleared between $3k and $5k a month playing in my spare time. That money combined with my day job and I was always pretty comfortable financially. Poker isn't an option anymore unfortunately.

My job. I sell pianos, my dad owns a piano store. I've been involved in a lot of sales positions. I've sold vacations, time shares, pianos, mortgages, and have always done well with selling face to face. I've been on a terrible cold streak for the last 2 months though, haven't made any sales or commissions, and now I'm pretty much broke for the first time in a while.

I'm about $5k in debt. Not a whole lot. The problem is I owe my current landlord $1k for this months rent, and need to come up with an additional $1500 to get moved into a new place next month.

The problem is that I'm not making any damn money right now at work. I don't really enjoy my job, but the money is usually pretty good. I think my confidence has dropped down some because of this slump I'm in.

So, I'm thinking about getting another job. There's a local web design firm hiring an Account manager. I think it'd be the perfect fit for me because I do great with face to face sales, and while I don't claim to be a great web designer, I do know some xhtml and a little bit of CSS, so I'd be able to communicate with the designers and the customers better than your average sales person. I haven't contacted this company yet, so I'm not sure what they'd pay, but if it's decent I think it'd be a good idea for me to get in good with some web designers, maybe even find a future business partner.

What I want to do: Earn a fulll time income online. I'm obsessed with technology, I love marketing, I'm the hardest worker I know, so I'd say it's more of a question of when, not if, I'm going to get the ball rolling.

I think my biggest strengths are my interpersonal skills, I'm a quick learner, I have a strong understanding of marketing and persuasion, and I'm not afraid to take risks.

Biggest weaknesses right now... I get easily bored, frustrated when it comes to mundane details like coding a website. Most of my landing pages are blogs or shitty looking templates that I've ripped from the net. I really need to brush up on my CSS and learn to design some nice pages. I also get caught up in researching, reading forums, blogs, ect instead of getting out there and trying to make money.

Biggest problem right now is I have no working capitol. Sucks too. I was researching a certain niche today. I thought up a keyword that would be good for PPC. Turns out it gets 10k searches a month on overture, a high volume on google, and there's no competition for it. Not one single ad, and it's highly targeted to the product I want to promote. I'll probably just have to put it on the back burner for now, but I think I stumbled onto something good.

I guess to sum it up, I'm not used to being broke, I hate being broke, and I really don't know what the hell to do at this point. I hate the thought of getting another job, but I don't think I have a choice. If I go another month without a paycheck I'll literally be homeless and starving.

I guess I just posted this to get it off of my chest. I hope it doesn't sound whiny, I'm not looking for sympathy. I know there are a lot of extremely intelligent people here, so any advice would be awesome.

I'd also love to hear any stories of someone struggling coming up in this business before they became successful.

If you took the time to read all of that, I do appreciate it.
 


Wow.. 3 to 5k in poker, that is pretty awesome. If you were making that kind of money playing poker, why not continue doing that? That's more than a lot of people make.. as long as you dont have a month where you lose 10k or something like that.

Also I think if you found an untapped niche, you should go for it. Get into it and try to make money in it before somebody else catches on to it. Just start with say $200 via credit card... test the waters. If it fails, well, you only lost $200. If it succeeds, then keep pumping money into it. It depends how confident you can turn a profit in that niche.
 
You sound like me!

My job is fairly low paying - and I pay $1300/month in rent...NYC is not cheap.

I have the same personality traits- which is why I am trying as hard as I can to strike out on my own- being stuck in a cube is not the way I want to spend the rest of my life.

This year i got hit with some unexpected medical bills and owed $12k on top of everything else (I also got enganged and have 5 bachlor parties to go to for close friends of mine- not cheap!).

I could not pay off my bills - and had lots of ideas I wanted to get going on online...

I took a loan out from Prosper.com - 11.5% interest is not bad, and there is no way I could have taken the amount I asked for at that price from any bank loan. Its a great place to go if you need some cash to get started.

I paid off my bills - and moved the rest to my LLC account so I wouldn't be able to touch it. I have two sites being built right now - and am in the works for a third. I am hoping at least one of these take off - I could not think of a better job. I literally could spend days in a row with no sleep working on my projects if it weren't for my full time job..

Since I am bored easily w/ details- I hired some cheap programmers to help. I write up a very detailed plan about what i am looking for, and walk them through each step, and then critique their every move... but at least I am not coding! I enjoy the project mgt more than anything else - its cool seeing how things work out.

Anyway- time to get going - 5pm and I want to work on my things at home.

Good luck with things - I figure if you keep trying something is bound to happen as long as you aren't afraid to fail often until you succeed.
 
wickedDUDE said:
Wow.. 3 to 5k in poker, that is pretty awesome. If you were making that kind of money playing poker, why not continue doing that? That's more than a lot of people make.. as long as you dont have a month where you lose 10k or something like that.

Also I think if you found an untapped niche, you should go for it. Get into it and try to make money in it before somebody else catches on to it. Just start with say $200 via credit card... test the waters. If it fails, well, you only lost $200. If it succeeds, then keep pumping money into it. It depends how confident you can turn a profit in that niche.
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Yeah, I miss poker. But the new legislation literally killed online play. I'm afraid of getting my money frozen if I try to withdraw, and they've scared away most of the bad players, so it's harder to make any money.

I could move to Las Vegas and grind, but that isn't as much fun as it sounds. I'm just going to keep poker a fun past time and try to make my living some other way.

As for the niche, I'm thinking about trying to scrape up a few hundred bucks and make something happen.

Funny thing, right after I posted this these people came in to my store. They want to buy a 12k grand piano tomorrow, if that goes through it'll help me out a lot.

Reefer, haha that's pretty funny, good to know there are others in the same boat.

Thanks for the replies.
 
wickedDUDE said:
Wow.. 3 to 5k in poker, that is pretty awesome. If you were making that kind of money playing poker, why not continue doing that? That's more than a lot of people make.. as long as you dont have a month where you lose 10k or something like that.
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The US government has made this much more difficult, but not impossible. If he was bonus whoring too then he got hit 2 times as bad. I was in the same boat, although not making quite as much. For me it's just not worth it, too much damn work and time. Especially if you have to work a 40 hour a week job also. IM is much easier, just takes a while to actually get going.
 
I read your post, however I can't say I know how you feel; I'm still in high school. I also can't provide any significant advice, other than don't give up on yourself. Keep busting your ass and soon something will change for the better.
 
You're lucky, you're smart enough to start learning this stuff in highschool.

I didn't even start to learn html until I realized the easy poker money was gone about 6 months ago.
 
Man life has its ups and downs. 10 months ago I was literally starving. I had to bounce my rent check one month just to feed myself.

Thanks to IM and some clever moves on my part I'm back on my feet and doing well. Don't fret the small shit man, you'll be fine.
 
Sorry to hear that someone with so much going for them is feeling so low. Advice from an old git: if you've found something you like - go for broke. You only live once.
 
wordssap said:
Sorry to hear that someone with so much going for them is feeling so low. Advice from an old git: if you've found something you like - go for broke. You only live once.
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Solid advice, but get that $7 eBook out of your sig or you will be banned faster than you know what.
 
I feel for you mate, kinda know what it's like.

I was successfully selling psilocybin (magic) mushrooms then the government here changed the law.

Any other businesses would get compensation if a change in law put them out of business - but we're seen gamblers and drug dealers... Does no harm to anyone else but still Big Brother doesn't like it.

If you've got an idea for a profitable niche with PPC why not test it out with the free credit deals from Google or Yahoo? (There's an Adwords credit link in my blog if you need one.)

Or get ya dad to pay you a salary rather than commission!! :D

GL mate.
 
Where the hell did you live that you could legally sell shrooms? Sweet fuckin job I'd say.

Scott, I can't say that I've been in your situation before since I'm still living at home (hopefully not much longer). All I can really say is that based on your posts here on WF that you seem like a smart guy and I'm sure you'll pull yourself out of the slump that you're in. Remember to look at your situation as a learning experience and you'll hopefully never be in this situation again.
 
lucab said:
huh... what limits and games were you playing online, and on what sites?
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I played mostly 2/4 to 5/10 limit stud8 and omaha8, and pl omaha8. As for sites, at one time everywhere there was a bonus. As things wound down mostly Stars and Absolute.
 
cool. i have played a decent amount of lo8, live and online, but never above 5/10. plo8 is a confusing game to me - you constantly have to fold the nuts lol!

i was actually asking the OP though... curious as to the games he played, and why he doesn't feel safe playing on a site like stars.
 
I played various levels. I'd multi table $50 stt's, and I played MTT's from $50 up to sometimes $500. I mainly played on UB, and in local tournaments here in town.

For some reason I never feel comfortable playing cash games online, I feel like I need to see people in cash games and get reads, where in tournaments it's a more mechanical approach to the game and I play them fine online. But when I played cash it was usually $1-$2 or $2-$4.

I was dumb though, I never really tried to build a bankroll to play higher, I just spent the money. Sometimes I'd take a shot at a higher level without the roll to support it, which isn't a smart idea.

I decided to distance myself from the game after the whole neteller incident. I'll still play when I go to Vegas or with my friends, but for the time being I don't plan on playing anymore online.
 
pfgannon said:
Where the hell did you live that you could legally sell shrooms? Sweet fuckin job I'd say.
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UK - fresh ones were legal here until 2005 - It was fun for a while!

They were grown in Holland, imported and distributed here with tax paid all the way down the line. I could make loads and still be half the price of local shops - started on eBay then had a site selling them when eBay decided they were going to use US not local laws.

Now they are class A's - if you have them in your garden and know what they are it's the same as possessing heroin!! (very fucked up drug laws here!)
 
Boo hoo hoo get me my tissue. I am tired of these long sob stories. Just go make money. In the time it took you to type that huge rambling post you could have launched an adwords campaign. Maybe go to scholo and get a job that pays better.
 
Fuck if I knew trhat I would have pushed harder to visit the UK when I had the chance. And don't even get me started on fucked up drug laws in the US.

Sorry Scott I'll let you have your thread back.
 
TakeYourMeds said:
Boo hoo hoo get me my tissue. I am tired of these long sob stories. Just go make money. In the time it took you to type that huge rambling post you could have launched an adwords campaign. Maybe go to scholo and get a job that pays better.
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Thanks for that valuable post.

Anyway, I'm actually thinking of taking some classes if I get to a point where I can afford it. I need to learn PHP, and get more proficient with xtml/css. Maybe some marketing classes.

But, I'm not going to school so I can get a job. If I have to have a job, it's going to be sales related. I've got the resume for sales, there's money in sales, so if I'm going to be working for someone else that's probably the route I'll take.

My whole plan revolves around not having to work for somebody else.
 
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