Benchilcote.net and 2013
Happy New Year!
In fall of 2009 I went through a significant spiritual awakening – coming to a deeper understanding of who am I am why I am on Earth. That epiphany gave me the needed fuel to start blogging. 3 years later, I have left my small footprint online. In 2013 I will continue to wiggle my foot to make the print a bit wider and deeper. Here are some updates.
.COM to .NET
Funny story. Last month I went to log in to my website to find it didn’t exist any more. Upon a frantic investigation, I found out some guy in some foreign country was now the registrant of the domain benchilcote.com. When I contacted godaddy.com about what appeared to be a hacked account, they reported back that my domain had expired and I would have to contact the new registrant directly. Huh?! So, I wrote the guy and asked to buy it back. He said he’d be happy to sell it back to me for $150 – in order to break even. I counter offered $50 but he said no deal. So… I moved my site to benchilcote.net, which I’m starting to like. It’s more fitting to what I’m doing online anyway – expanding my brand to a network of websites and other ventures.
The only problem is I’ve lost a bit of momentum and page rank with the search engines. But I’ll get that back with time.
writechristiansongs.com
The WCS Songwriting Club and writechristiansongs.com has continued to steadily grow. All in 2012 it was born, faded away, then made a comeback. It is now growing with self-sustaining momentum and currently sits at at 750 “likes”. I plan to expand what I’m doing as the “curator” of writechristiansongs.com. Possible projects include an ebook, community forum, interview videos, and even a paid membership area. I hope to continue building the WCS Songwriting Club with the goal to become the premier community for Christian songwriters worldwide. Yeah!
Internet Marketing
I have officially stepped into the world of Affiliate Marketing. If you don’t know, affiliate marketing is promoting someone else’s product or service and then receiving commission off any sales. Basically, one has a product to promote, creates a website on a similar subject with a lot of helpful content, drives targeted traffic to the site, and gets people to click on the offer to buy.
I have always been interested in owning my own business and this is a way to do it online without the need for a lot of investment. I have launched a few small ventures and will continue to grow them over time in hopes to create some passive income. I have a handful of sites in the making and a few that are up and running including www.connorstest.com, www.logitechhdproc920review.com and www.powerpointipad.org. These sites are all less than 2 months old and are getting organic traffic. I’m new at it but learning a lot and having a blast.
Music
I haven’t made the time to sit down and write too much lately. From Fall 2012 through the end of the year, family and work life really pressed in and squeezed a lot of creative time out. I would like to see some new music in 2013 and maybe some new studio recordings. I have enough work to put a full album together. We’ll see! Until then, In Good Hands continues to get 100-200 views a day on YouTube and I’m grateful for the blessings it has been to families all over the world!