Michael Dunlop is a 21 year old internet marketer who is most well known for his large income blogs such as IncomeDiary and Retireat21, together receiving millions of visitors and have been featured in newspapers, magazines and books around the world. Find out how he did it and, more importantly, how you can do it too!
Tell us a little background info about yourself. Where are you from? How old are you? How long have you been working in this industry?
I grew up in a small village called East Preston on the south coast of England and currently live in Southampton. I am 21 years old, but have been working online since around 15.
What accomplishments so far are you the most proud of?
Honestly, I really couldn’t decide what I’m most proud of because I have very high standards, but to give you a cut down list of a few things I have done:
* Had millions of people visit my sites
* Featured in books, magazines and newspapers around the world
* Asked by MTV to be in a new show they are working on.
* Being young and financially independent is probably the most important one.
How did you come to learn about this industry? Why did you choose this career? When did you first realize the full potential in blogging and affiliate marketing? When did you first “hit the big time?”
I was 14 at the time and I was at school competing in a competition called the Young Enterprise and I had to build a site for my business were I was selling brand new mobile phones and digital cameras. My dad connected me with someone who knew how to use Dreamweaver and I really just took it from there. I chose to do this as a career because I knew I had to be an entrepreneur anyway because I lacked any qualifications from school and wasn’t prepared to be paid $5 a hour to work for someone else. The internet just makes it so easy as an entrepreneur to start and see a return so that's why. I first saw the potential when I connected the dots between finding a problem and creating a solution, that’s where the money is. I created IncomeDiary and the very first month the blog earned $5000 and since then it has just gone through the roof and I never looked back.
What do you think it takes to be successful as a blogger and affiliate?
I think the most important thing for me was to think big, sure you need to provide value and do all these other things but if I didn’t think big, I wouldn’t be BIG. GO BIG, or GO HOME.
What have been your biggest failures and frustrations?
I wouldn’t really say I had failures, definitely a lot of set backs and things not working out as well as you had first thought. I think failure and success go hand in hand, any success I have had, there has always been some failures involved, that’s how we find out what works and what doesn’t.
What is the single toughest problem you've had to face, and how did you get through it?
Spelling, like I mentioned at the beginning, I failed most things at school as I was very dyslexic, I was one of those people who read a page in a book, it took me so long that I had forgot what was the page was even about. If you look at anything I wrote 2 years ago on Retireat21 and look at my writing now, you wouldn’t believe it was the same person, It has improved greatly just because I do it every day, however I still get a few dicks who like to mention I have grammar issues, at least that’s my only issue. My teachers wouldn’t believe that I now write for a living.
Which methods of promotion do you favor?
As I’m a blogger/affiliate marketer - I have found by providing great valuable content on my blog, I have been able to bring long term great traffic to my site with no effort at all, it simply comes. People are always look for amazing content, that’s ho we learn.
How have you made those promotion methods successful?
I connect all my affiliate promotions with a HOW TO. So for example, anything I’m writing about, it has to involve them using a product of some sort that they have to buy. So for example, how to get more followers on Twitter, I show them how I do it with TweetAdder and so it’s educational and a promotion at the same time.
What have you been up to recently? What projects are you working on?
Recently just launched a Clickbank product called Popup Domination, I’m getting 100’s of new subscribers daily so it felt only write that I put the tool I’m using to do it into a WordPress Plugin so people could duplicate my success. I’m always working on my main site called IncomeDiary - there is always something I can be doing to improve it and up my game so that I stand out as the BEST.
What problems have you had with those new projects?
Rushing it although I do think this is why it was successful. So many people plan to do something and they plan it out but they never get much further, I just powered through and got my team working constantly on it so that it was done ASAP. As we rushed it, we didn’t have many affiliates on board and so only myself and a couple other friends brought in the majority of the sales although I believe it will sell every day for years because it solves a HUGE problem and easily.
What are your greatest strengths?
Quick thinking and getting what I want.
One thing I have found in life and business is that if you want something, just ask for it. Jon asked me for this interview, he got it. Jon asked for my plugin to review it, he got it. I asked Jon for a review a while back and although I can afford full price, I might as well ask for 2 for the price of one, nothing stopping me and I got it. You can get a lot more out of life and business if you just ASK!
What are your greatest weaknesses?
Consistency, work ethic and short fuse at times.
You take your eye of the game for one minute and you will start to lose momentum, traffic and sales.
What motivates you?
Lifestyle.
What is the best advice you’ve been given and try to apply to your life?
Entrepreneurship is about living a few years of your life like most won’t, so you can live the rest of your life like most can’t.
Who has impacted you most in your career, and how?
So many people have impacted my business, perhaps my Dad (barrydunlop.com) would be at the top of list.
What kinds of people do you have difficulties working with? Any good stories?
Slow thinkers, honestly, I think 10x quicker then the typical person and I expect everyone to keep up and if you don’t, I have very little time for you. However, I have learnt to slow down and be more considerate .gif){kind=icon}
Anyone who thinks they are better then me when they aren’t - sure there’s a few people I work with that I really clever and I look up to, however sometimes I come across people who just think they are. They usually have a little overnight success and think they are really clever when really they know nothing and when I make suggestions they throw it in my face, I have little time for these people. I’m always learning, never think you're too great to learn.
What are some of your long-term goals? How much is enough? If money was no object, what would you be doing?
Grow a new business I’m starting to earning 7 figures monthly and selling for a 9 figure deal in a few years to come. Money doesn’t mean to much to me, sure I would like to have enough to live very comfortably, but selling a company for hundreds of millions would just be for my own personal benefit, knowing that I could do it. Money is like points for me, it’s just a way to see how well I’m doing.
What is your greatest achievement outside of work? What are some of your unfulfilled dreams?
Considering I’m young, there’s so much I plan to do still, the first two things being, buy a house and a old mustang which I believe will be soon anyway. As for achievements... killing 1732 zombie on COD5 Nazi Zombies. To be honest, that question is just to hard to answer. Things have just begun for me.
Do you have a Twitter account or Facebook “Like” page?
twitter.com/michaeldunlop
Probably the biggest benefit to you adding WP Answers is... Traffic. Not only are you going to rank better for SEO (because a huge amount of people type questions into the search engines) but you're also [probably] going to get more traffic because of it..gif){kind=icon}
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