Just Make Money Online

7 Things About Me: On Business

by Shai Coggins on November 7th, 2007

So, I’ve been tagged here at JMMO by Scott from LinkedIntelligence on “7 Things About Me That You Might not Know.” Since this isn’t my personal blog, it feels a bit strange to tell you about kids, pets and hobbies. That’s why I thought I’ll just share with you 7 things about my life in the world of business that you might not know about.

Here ‘ya go…

1) I grew up in a family of business-minded folks. I was literally raised in a store! In fact, one of my mom’s favourite stories was leaving me on top of a box of stuff in the store at only 2 weeks old. So, it probably was a natural flow that I started helping out in the family business at a very young age.

2) I began my own business at about age 8 or 9! Sold school supplies just outside my mom’s store, usually a month or so before the school year started. My mom provided the supplies, I sold them in a little made-up stall (of boxes and wooden crates), I gave her back the retail price and I got to keep some of the profits. I thought it was so cool to learn how to make money that way.

3) Some other businesses I’ve tried: Sold drinks in a stall (lemonade stand style), sold the latest gadgets/supplies to classmates (I hated doing this), consultancy, printing/desktop publishing, selling ebooks, and selling artwork, among others.

4) There was a period in my life when I HATED (as in absolutely loathed) selling anything - and talking about money. Seriously. I thought it was all pure evil.  It took me a few years to get over that. A part of me still feels a bit timid with selling and money talks (ironic, given I have a ‘make money online’ blog, eh?). But, I have realised that it’s not about the selling or the money - but it’s how you go about doing your business.

5) Doing something different is something I always strive to do - even in business. Since my family was very much in to retail businesses at one time (they’ve expanded in to other areas now), I badly wanted to stay away from retail. That’s why I went in to consultancy, training, and printing/desktop publishing when I started to explore business as more of a serious option. My business name then was called: WonderWorks. :-) I had a good time but left that area to venture in to online/media business, especially when I started to live life as an expatriate.

6) b5media is probably one business move that I feel really proud of and happy with. I especially like the fact that with b5, we’re able to support other people’s dreams to make money online. In fact, believe it or not, when I began this blog (JMMO, formerly AboutWeblogs’ Make Money Online: The Internet Income blog), I didn’t really start it as a way to make money but to help out my bloggers when I started AboutWeblogs. I was getting a lot of questions on how to monetise blogs, so I began the blog to help them out. So very happy to see now that I once was sending off money to bloggers that didn’t even come to $50 a month to 20+ bloggers - to now sending thousands of dollars to a couple of hundred bloggers through b5.

7) Someone actually recently offered 5 figures to buy off this blog (JMMO) from me. That’s my second offer to buy off one of my web properties (the first one was to buy off AboutWeblogs.com as a  blogging network). I’ve never sold a blog or website before - and I don’t know why, but I find this a bit difficult to do. So maybe that’s one challenge for me to do: To build and sell off a site. In any case, I AM staying put. I’m not about to sell off JMMO just yet. Don’t know if I ever will. ;-)

OK - this is the part that I don’t like about memes. Tagging other bloggers! While I don’t mind responding to some memes, I don’t like to obligate folks to do the same. But then, some folks do enjoy this sort of thing. So, hopefully, whoever I end up tagging will have fun. If not, please don’t worry too much. It’s OK to stop the meme! ;-)

Anyway, it looks like another fellow b5er Miki Saxon (of Leadership Turn) responded to this meme. So, let me tag another b5er, Glen of the really cool LifeDev blog.

JMMO Readers Mitch, Thomas, and Shane.

Also, Alfa, my regular guest blogger here at JMMO.

And, one of my favourite bloggers: BusyMom. And, another fave: Wendy from eMomsatHome.

Also, if you’ve responded to this meme, just let me know.

Technorati Tags: business, jobs, memes, money, personal, selling, shai coggins

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