Hello and welcome to Leaving Work Behind! If you want to quit your job and build your own online success story, you’re in the right place.
My aim with this blog is to teach you how to succeed in the world of online business – whether that be through blogging, freelancing, affiliate marketing, or something else altogether.
I do that by offering up full disclosure on everything I do with my own business – my successes and my failures.
Let’s get started!
How to Create Your First Blog
If you have aspirations to build an online business and kiss goodbye to that job, you will need a website and/or blog. Much of my online earnings to date – from my freelance earnings to my information products – has been thanks to blogging.
I have just one recommendation when it comes to creating and publishing content online, and that is self-hosted WordPress. In case you don’t know, WordPress is a Content Management System (CMS) – it makes creating your own website and online content a piece of cake.
You’ll also need a domain name and some hosting. My only recommendation for both is WestHost. Their entry-level hosting package enables you to carve out your own corner of the web for the price of a cup of coffee (per month), and their quality of service is unparalled (I say that having tried pretty much all of the major hosting providers).
If you are worried that starting your own blog is a complicated affair, don’t worry — it isn’t. In fact, I created a ten minute video that shows you exactly how to start your first blog:
I have also written a comprehensive beginner’s guide to blogging that tells you everything you need to know in order to get started:
How I Make a Full Time Living in Part Time Hours
Let’s move onto the online business I created that allowed me to quit my job in just 90 days.
What if I told you that there was a way for you to build up a viable and sustainable business in three months or less, on the side, earning upwards of $50 per hour? I’d like to think you’d be interested.
Well that’s exactly what I did in late 2011. In just three months I went from being completely frustrated with my efforts to build an online business and quit my job, to earning $30-$50 per hour and handing my notice in. In January 2012 I quit my job, went “full time” with my new business (i.e. 2–4 hours per day) and now earn nearly $100 per hour. I’ve never looked back.
You may be wondering how I did this, and the answer is remarkably simple – freelance blogging. I write blog posts for other people and they pay me for them. Freelance blogging is by a distance the easiest and most accessible way to make money online that I have come across, and the barriers of entry are incredibly low. If you consider yourself a competant writer (you don’t even need to have any blogging experience) then you have the only foundational skill required in order to become a successful freelance blogger.
Whilst you can attempt to make your own way, I would advise that you learn from my successes and mistakes by consulting my best freelance blogging posts here on Leaving Work Behind:
- 9 Reasons Why You Should Choose Freelance Blogging
- Get Paid to Write (in 3 Steps)
- Freelance Writing: How To Find Your First Job
- How to Spot Viable Freelance Writing Opportunities on Job Boards
- Freelance Writing Jobs for Beginners (Without Using Job Boards)
On the other hand, if you want all the help you’ll need to launch your own successful freelance blogging business, check out my comprehensive guide:
Stay On Track and Get My Free Resources!
Before you charge ahead with building your successful online business, take a moment to subscribe to my completely free newsletter.
It’s full of exclusive content not available here on the blog (some of my best stuff in fact). But that’s not all – I’ll also give you a free copy of my guide to search engine keyword research. If you’re planning on creating your own website or blog or becoming a freelance blogger, you’ll need to know about this stuff.
Just enter your email address below and I’ll send you a copy of the guide immediately!
Just one more thing – if you have any questions at all, please do not hesitate to get in touch. I pride myself in responding to just about every single message I receive from Leaving Work Behind readers and would be delighted to help you in whatever way I can. Head over to my Facebook page now and say hi!
All the best,
Tom Ewer
Creative Commons image courtesy of andyp uk and Meredith Harris