Niche Twins - Surely there's been a mistake...

March has been an oddly significant month in my niche site / side-hustle journey over recent years.

It marks two years since I started my Twitter account.

I don't know exactly how to verify this, but I am fairly certain I've tweeted at least once a day, every single day since.

It was also almost exactly a year ago today that the funds from the sale of my site officially hit my bank account.

I broke the news here - the first ever "Niche Twins newsletter".

That edition is actually hanging on the wall directly behind me as I type this.

My wife had it framed - she knew how much it all meant (means) to me.

Keith and I have gone on to send a newsletter every single week since.

52 weeks.

52 newsletters.

And today, March 9th, 2024 marks day 5 of what looks to be one of the most significant Google search algorithm updates in recent memory.

All this has got me thinking about this wild journey that started a little over 4 years ago.

I've got thoughts.

Here are some of them, in no particular order.

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1. It's been 4 YEARS since I started blogging?! Surely there's been a mistake. Truly feels like yesterday that I started writing on my train ride commute into Boston. The days are long, but the years are short. Cliche. But absolutely true - and a little scary.
2. When I first started blogging I didn't tell anyone but my wife. I was genuinely worried about what people would think. Eventually I told my brothers and then a few friends what I was up to, and they...were supportive. You see, most people don't actually care what you're up to. It's almost entirely in our own heads. In fact, most people aren't thinking about you at all! What a relief.
3. Whatever success we've had so far, I attribute mostly to consistency. 350 blog posts. 52 newsletters. 17,000 tweets/replies. People give up too easily. Don't.
4. I love "working" with Keith. There are few things more enjoyable than waking up, having an idea, giving him a call, and then scheming for 10-20 minutes. If I had all the money in the world, I'd still want to do that.
5. You can't rely on organic traffic. Getting old saying it. Getting old hearing it. But it bears repeating. If your livelihood depends on a site, or even several sites that get most of their traffic from Google, you need to quickly reevaluate things. It's not a matter of if you'll lose traffic, but when. Diversify traffic streams. Diversity income streams.
6. It is incredible what even just an additional few thousand dollars a month does for your life. I spent years stressing over budgets. Turns out making my coffee at home didn’t move the needle. I spent years buying assets, hoping they would rapidly appreciate in value. Turns out investments take time, and hope isn’t a strategy. What actually changed EVERYTHING was adding new income streams. Start a side hustle!
7. One massive benefit of having a side hustle that I didn’t anticipate - I’m better at my 9-5. Before my side hustle more of my identity than I’d like to admit was tied up in my “career”. Having a side hustle has freed me up mentally and emotionally to perform better at work. I have other income, and other interests. I’m not solely dependent on one thing. It’s a huge mental shift.
8. Speaking of 9-5s, I'm glad I trusted my gut and kept my full time job even when my niche site was earning tens of thousands of dollars a month at its peak. I had a lot of people online tell me I was nuts. It just felt far too risky to rely solely on Google traffic for my income. Having my job through all the chaos of these search updates and algorithm changes has been so important for me - mentally, and financially.
9. Still hard to believe that writing was the thing that changed everything. Wouldn’t have been in my top 100 guesses 4 years ago. I massively undervalued its impact. Provides others a glimpse into how you think. Amazing opportunities follow.
10. I still think Twitter is one of the most valuable and underrated social platforms. The connections you can make on there are incredible. Keith and I "met" our now business partner on Twitter. We bought a business with him (Keysearch.co) without ever meeting him in person (still haven't). Now we text every other day and we're constantly looking for our next deal 👀
11. Some people are incapable of rooting for you. No matter what you do, or how you do it - it (you?) bother them. You can't, and won't change their mind. Just move on. You don't need them. That they are unable to be happy for your success speaks volumes about them, not you.
12. Passive income is mostly a lie. I've worked more in the last 4 years than any previous 4 year period of my life.
13. No one really knows what to take away from a Google search update until after the update is finished rolling out. Sometimes it isn't until months after. Sometimes never. Often it's just not all that clear why certain sites were impacted, while others weren't (even though some folks will try to tell you otherwise). So I beg you not to take any drastic action, or make any changes to your site(s) until after the dust has settled.
14. People love to overact. When Elon bought Twitter, "Twitter will die. It will go offline. They fired too many engineers. Mastodon is taking over. Threads is taking over" (remember Threads?). When Google releases a new update or feature, "SEO is dead. AI is going to kill search." There are countless other examples. Not to say there isn't some truth to these reactions, but most of the time the thing isn't "dead", it's just evolved. Adapt. Or die.
15. Persist. I repeat...PERSIST.
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That's it.

Rambling done.

Thanks for following along these past few years.

Have a great weekend.

You and I will talk again soon.

-Mike

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PS: Since it's the the 1 year anniversary of this newsletter, here are 3 of my favorite editions:

#01 | 1 Blog. 3 Years. 7 Figures in Profit.

​https://nichetwins.com/niche-site-project-1-sold/

#42 | 4 Lessons of 2023 ✍️

​https://nichetwins.com/4-lessons-of-2023/

#45 | Our greatest weakness.

​https://nichetwins.com/our-greatest-weakness/​

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