Niche Website Side Hustle

Niche Website Side Hustle: My Experience and Journey

In an earlier post where I share my top favorite online side hustle, I listed Niche Website as one of them. In this MELEPAK session, I will be sharing my journey and experience running this niche website side hustle. So if you are interested to learn more about this hustle (not an easy one), then please join me in this MELEPAK session. Let’s go!

How I First Begin With Niche Website Side Hustle?

I’ve started this hustle in 2012 after I’ve decided to close my blogshop (Yes, I once had a blogshop selling woman’s clothing but that will be in another post). Back then, I have ZERO knowledge about it. I only found out about it when I listen to a number of podcast such as SPI by Pat Flynn, Niche Pursuits by Spencer Haws and Empire Flippers by Joe Magnotti and Justin Cooke.

My First Website

This side hustle has a huge learning curve and I consumed a lot of information and tutorials back when I first started. My first website was bought from Flippa (a marketplace for website and online businesses) for USD20. YES! Only USD20!!

First Website Purchase
My first website 8 years ago in 2012

But of course, what do you expect from a USD20 site? Just pure junk and nothing else. The only reason I bought it was to learn how to manage a website. I believe the only way you truly learn is via experience and action. So, there is no point for me to watch tons of Youtube tutorial if I am not taking action. As such, I decided to bought a cheap site for trial and playplay around with it.

From this site alone, I learnt the basic of managing website via wordpress, basic understanding about domain and hosting. With this site, I really experimented and tried all that I’ve watched and read on the net with regards to website. A cheap price to pay for such lessons. =)

Expedite your learning through actions and experience. Don’t get caught up with consuming all the information but not doing anything. Analysis paralysis.

Pak Melepak

My First Proper Website + Earning

The first proper website of mine was purchased via Empire Flippers (previously known as Adsense Flippers). It was monetized via Google Adsense and was earning about $50/mth when I bought it. To be honest, I can’t really remember what the site is and how much I paid for it but if I have to guess, it would be 15x or $750.

With that site, I signed up with Adsense and made my first dollar online. It was exhilarating and I can still remember the day I got the cheque from Google. (I wish I had saved the cheque and framed it). With that site, I managed to recover my initial capital of $750 and a little more.

But more than that, I was convinced that I can make money from this sidehustle and press on. From that moment on, I went all out and the journey continues.

My Progress From Niche Website Side Hustle

For the past 8 years, I’ve lost count the number of sites I’ve managed. (It could be in the hundreds) I’ve started sites and it became successful before selling it off. Bought a number of sites and earned passive income. Flipped a number of sites and many, many more. And of course there are also a lot of sites that was a failure and did not take off the way I wanted.

Biggest Achievement from Niche Website

My biggest achievement so far from this hustle is a six figure sum for one of my website. Sold it in 2019 which enables me to buy my first condo. I used a broker (FE International) to help sell that site as it is a bigger deal than normal. The site was earning an average of $3200 per month and I got a good multiple for it due to these reasons:

  • Site is stable and aged (5 years old)
  • Multiple traffic source and monetization
  • Valuable assets such as email list, ebooks, infographics etc

My Current Standing with This Side Hustle

Currently, I have 6 websites that I am actively working on. (That’s a lot to handle, ya? I also think so. And am looking to sell the smaller ones) As of August, total monthly earnings for my website side hustle is $4160 from Amazon affiliate, Adsense, Ezoic, Adthrive and Guest Post.

However, take note that that amount is before accounting the cost of managing and running all these sites.

Are You Interested To Learn More About This Side Hustle?

With that, I hope I’ve managed to provide an idea of this side hustle of mine. It definitely not an easy side hustle as there are a lot that you need to learn before you can even see some earnings. BUT once you get the hang of things, it is easy and cheap to duplicate.

That’s all our MELEPAK session today. Hope you gained some useful things from this sharing and if you are keen to learn more about this side hustle, feel free to email me. I love to share on this topic. If you have any question, please comment below. Cheers and stay safe!

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