A couple of weeks ago my wife went on a trip to Hawaii with her parents for a week.  During that time I made plans to work on my Blog Business course that I’m planning on releasing this year.

I was thinking that the time I normally set aside to spending with her in the evenings I could set aside to work on the course instead to give me a nice boost to get started on it.

It may not seem like much, but even just 3-4 hours/day extra that I would normally spend having dinner with my wife and hanging out with her can add up quickly if I were to focus myself.  Multiply those 3-4 hours by the 10 days or so that she was gone and it adds up to 30-40 hours.  Putting 30-40hours of extra work into a project, especially when you’re just getting going can be a big boost.

However, to my surprise something really interesting happened.

I’m looking for three to five beta testers for my upcoming Blog Business course.  The course is very much still in it’s infancy stages, but I am looking for a few people who would like to participate in testing the course as I build it.

In exchange for helping me beta test the course, the participants will of course get free access to the course materials as I create and publish them, as well as semi-private coaching and the opportunity to potentially earn some money by promoting the course as affiliates when I launch it.

Ideally I am looking for people who fit this criteria:

• Want to build an online business centered around a Blog
• Looking to launch or re-launch a Blog from scratch (new domain, new hosting setup etc.)
• Willing to follow what I teach to the letter so I can better test the training
• Have ability/desire/passion to create content, just looking for direction on how to build a solid online business
• Possibly already have or planning to offer services, or products online
• Preferably not someone who is a total techie or programmer as I want someone who can test the beginner level content too
• Preferably someone comfortable with computers, word processing, taking photos etc.
• Has high-speed Internet, email, etc.
• Has approx. 8-16hrs/week to devote to building their online business.  (Not just for training but for assignments/building their business)

As I mentioned, I am just now starting to begin scripting out and putting together content for the course so if you’re interested, you’ll need to be patient in waiting for me to produce and publish the content.

So far I’ve got a domain registered, a CMS platform installed with membership site functionality mostly setup.  I’ve also created one video lesson so far to test some things like video encoding, hosting, editing, audio editing, etc.

The rest of the lessons I have mostly in handwritten notes across my journals so they still need to put together into scripted text for me to create video’s from.

As of right now my intention is for this course to have a lot of video content.  More than I have ever created before, so I’m still learning how to do that right now.

Another benefit to the beta group is that I will work with them as I create the course to make sure they are getting as much out of the training as possible and in a way customize the content to their needs.

I will not charge anything for the access to all the videos and course materials, but participants should be aware that they will need to register their own domain and setup hosting as part of the training.

If you’re interested, leave a comment and I’ll contact you directly via email.

My wife is currently in Waikiki, Hawaii with her parents and this morning they were evacuated from their hotel room as a Tsunami warning hits Hawaii after a massive 8.8 earthquake hit Chile this morning.

The hotel they are staying in evacuated them from their 3rd floor hotel room, moving them to the 9th floor just in case the waves hit hard.  Sirens have been going off and announcements of the water and sewage systems being shut down were given.

I’ve been monitoring the situation on CNN, Twitter, and other Internet live-cams and websites.

My wife has been able to send me some pics from her 9th floor hotel room view, as they wait to see whether a tsunami hits Waikiki or if they dodge the bullet.

The last time my wife was in Hawaii was for our honeymoon back in October 2006, and during our honeymoon there was a major earthquake that hit Hawaii so this is kind of like deja-vu for her.

Once I get some more news and/or pics I’ll do an update.

** UPDATE: As of 3:44 PST, my wife reports they just announced on the hotel intercom that the warning is over.  Hawaii dodged a bullet.

I’ve begun work on an online course that’s going to teach people how to build a Blog as the central hub of their online business.

I get approached by people with online business ideas each and every week and they ask for my advice on their products or service idea.  I love helping people out so I don’t mind offering my opinion or advice, but it really surprises me that nobody is seeing the flaw in following a business model based on the “I have an idea so I should start a business!” theory.  Allow me to explain.

The Idea to Business Paradigm

The idea to business paradigm of launching a service or product is based on the theory that the primary success factor of a business is whether or not it starts with a “good idea”.  I hear people saying things like “I need a good business idea, then I’ll start my online business” or “I have a really good idea, what do you think?  Do you think it’s going to be successful?”

Questions like these imply that the “idea” for a business is the central determining factor for the success of an online business.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  An idea is just an idea, I have dozens of “good ideas” every week.  Most of them better than the ones people approach me with.  That’s not an ego statement, it’s just that I open myself up to ideas and I journal a lot so they come to me while I’m brainstorming in my journals.

However, an idea is just one little tiny part of a business model.  By itself it’s pretty much worthless.  The business model that you wrap around the idea is the value in a business, not the idea itself.

A couple of years ago I hired a professional design firm (Unique Blog Designs) to re-design my blog and at the same time I also hired an artist to create the mascot you see in my Blog header.

The reason I decided to invest the +$2,000 for a professional design and mascot was because I wanted to separate myself from other Bloggers out there who were mostly running free themes.  Today there are many theme websites that offer professional looking Wordpress themes but a few years ago there really wasn’t that much to choose from.  You either spent the money and went with a custom design or you suffered with one of the crappy looking free themes.

The other reason I wanted to invest in a theme and mascot was because I wanted to invest some money into the project so as to motivate me further to keep going with it.  Starting a Blog can be so easy and inexpensive which makes it so easy for people to start Blogs, but at the same time it makes it just as easy to ditch them as well.  If it cost $400,000 to start a Blog like it does to start some franchises, I guarantee 98% of people wouldn’t be abandoning their business after just a few weeks.

With the launch of Paulymath.com, I redesigned my Blog design and the Blog header to be a bit more streamlined but I still wanted the mascot design integrated into the header as I think it really represents my brand.