The year 2019 flew by so fast!
Last year, I didn’t do much because I traveled often. Even though I worked when I was on the road, it was difficult to focus.
This year has been different. I traveled abroad only three times in 2019, so I had more time to do things I hadn’t done before.
Actually, this year I did a lot of things.
Many of them I had planned to do at the beginning of the year. There were also things I hadn’t planned, but still got done.
Well, every year, I usually sum up what I’ve done and plan what I’m going to do next. I usually do it on Facebook, but this time I’ll do it in my blog.
Okay, it’s time to summarize what I’ve been doing.
I started blogging at TML
This year, I decided to start blogging regularly, starting with the first month of the year.
I still have my old blog, but I haven’t written anything there for a long time. The topics were quite varied and included internet marketing, lifestyle, travel, etc.
It was sort of a diary.
So I decided to create a new one that focuses on what I’m doing now, which is the internet marketing business.
Also, I made the name much cooler. 🙂
I published my first post on January 19, and I keep updating the blog with new articles once or twice a month.
It has been doing well. I have published 22 posts, one course that contains 16 articles, and almost 1,000 subscribers on my list.
Not bad for the first year, right? I plan to blog more regularly next year. Maybe I’ll keep posting two articles a month. 🙂
Creating the 1-Hour System
This course was actually created in late 2018, but in the form of an eBook.
It’s about how I built my print-on-demand business in just one hour a week.
It’s basically the process I used to create almost 100,000 print-on-demand products for my Amazon account.
I found that it’s difficult to update or add new content when it’s in an eBook format. So I reorganized the contents and published it as an online course (in text format) on my blog.
I created this course because many people were asking me how I was able to hire a VA to list many products like that at such a cheap price.
It’s difficult to explain over and over to many people, so I decided to create this course for them. Now they can read it and learn the process by themselves.
Over 200 people have joined it, and many of them have sent me screenshots showing the good results they got from repeating what I taught in the course.
I’m very happy with their results. 🙂
There’s nothing better than seeing your tribe use what you’ve taught them – and their fantastic results.
Next year, I plan to add new updates to this course about what I learned this year. So, 1HS crews, stay tuned!
Selling Print-on-Demand Products
I’ve been selling print-on-demand products using the low-hanging method since 2017, and I’m still doing it.
My Amazon account has been growing every month. New products are added every day.
I rarely touch it, because it’s mostly run by my virtual assistants.
But I’m not seeing much of an increase in sales this year. I think it’s because I don’t send new products to Amazon’s warehouse very often.
Most of my FBA sales are from my tried-and-true winning products, which have been selling for many years.
They’ve each sold over 1,000 units.
I saw that they were selling slowly in the past Q4, so next year I might have to find more products and make them FBA.
Apart from selling on Amazon, I also started selling POD products on Etsy.
I started in late October and have made almost $4K in about three months.
That’s not a bad move. I’m confident that I can make much more from Etsy next year.
My Amazon account was suspended for the first time.
Another interesting story this year was that my Amazon account was suspended for the first time.
At first, I was very depressed, because I had just ordered many boxes of FBA products for the coming Q4, and that costs a lot of money.
If my account was suspended, I would lose a ton of money, and the assets I’d hired my virtual assistants to create for years would be gone.
Anyway, luckily, I managed to get my account back.
Full story here: My Amazon Seller Account was Deactivated – Here’s my story, and what I did to get it back.
Making an awesome tool – PODTurbo!
This was the unplanned thing I accomplished this year.
The idea was born one day, when I was playing Arena of Valor with my programmer.
I told him to write a program to help me list products on Amazon and Etsy.
After my Amazon account got suspended, I tried to find a way to list products at a lower cost, so I could reduce my risk if Amazon suspended my account.
Also, Etsy doesn’t like multiple IP addresses having access to the same account, so I couldn’t hire a VA to list products there for me.
I’ve been working with my programmer for many months to make this new program a reality. We shared the idea and talked about what to do while we were playing game.
After a few months, the tool was ready. It’s called PODTurbo. Today, I use it to list products on Amazon, Etsy, eBay and make money from them.
I think PODTurbo will be useful for people who use my 1-Hour System, too.
Well, although I explained how I created a team to build my print-on-demand business for the 1-Hour System, some people can’t do it the same way I did because they don’t have the budget to hire a VA.
So I asked my programmer to tweak PODTurbo a bit, so other people could use it.
Currently, using this tool, people can list their products automatically on Amazon, Etsy, eBay, Shopify, and WooCommerce.
They don’t have to hire a VA anymore (but they do need a graphic designer to create designs for them).
I spent almost $20,000 to get a VA to list almost 100,000 products on Amazon over the past few years.
It was worth the price – because the revenue I made from these products was much more than that – but I would have saved lots of cash if PODTurbo had existed two years ago.
Anyway, it’s now ready, and people can use it to build their own print-on-demand businesses.
This system will be my main focus next year. My programmer and I have already planned what we’re going to do next, so our sellers can make more money using our system.
Haven’t tried the PODTurbo yet? – Join Here
Run more often
Apart from business, this year I plan to improve my health.
I’m now 30, but I don’t feel like 30. I often feel tired and sleepy during the day. I have to get some regular exercise.
I’d planned to run at least 10-12 times a month in. I tried to build a running habit, but I could only sustain it for a few months.
Good habits are easy to break if you don’t follow them regularly.
This is what I have to improve. I’ll try to run more regularly next year.
Keep Investing
As I wrote in my first blog post, after we’ve made some money, we need to invest some of it to stay wealthy.
Otherwise, inflation will decrease the value of your money over time.
This year, I’ll keep doing what I’ve been doing for years.
I put a part of my income into mutual funds every month, and I also add money to my stock portfolio as well.
Both of them keep growing every year.
If you have made some money, don’t forget to reserve some of it for your retirement.
What’s Next?
As for my 2020 plan … I don’t really have one yet.
What I’m going to do will be basically the same as what I did in 2019.
I’ll keep sharing my internet marketing journey on my blog. I plan to write at least two articles a month. I don’t think I have time to write more than that.
As for the 1-Hour System, I’ll keep adding new content, and updates on PODTurbo as well.
That’s the new system we can use to replace virtual assistants and save lots on hiring costs.
For the POD business, I’ll try to build more income from selling print-on-demand products on various marketplaces using PODTurbo.
Not just on Amazon – I’ll expand my products to Etsy, eBay, and other marketplaces as well.
I really like the low-hanging business model, because I don’t have to spend much time on it.
Another thing I will focus on next year is making PODTurbo even better.
My programmer and I have a plan to make the work of our sellers easier and help them make more money by selling print-on-demand products.
Currently, we support product sales on Amazon, Etsy, eBay, Shopify, and WooCommerce.
But we won’t stop there. We plan to connect our system with other marketplaces, too.
They are on the list, and some of them are in the development phase.
Once our system connects with these new marketplaces, our sellers will be able to add their products to those marketplaces and earn additional income automatically.
That’s our goal next year for PODTurbo.
Apart from my business goals, 2020 will be all about health and fitness.
I plan to do more exercise more next year, starting with running at least once or twice a week. Maybe cycling, too. (I’m not so sure about that last one, but I’ll have to do more of it than I did this year.)
That’s all for today. I hope you guys have wonderful holidays and are ready for 2020!
Talk soon 🙂
—Bank “Signing off a Brilliant Year” K.
