My Road To Internet Success - So Far!

I'm so grateful that this site exists and helped me to realize my potential. I read through many posts, especially the ones by people who had success before me, and followed them closely. I also paid attention to my mistakes and made amends for them so that next time they didn't happen again. Finally, I was determined to work hard – sometimes all night long – and never give up on myself!

For those wondering what it's like being a part of the internet community as an aspiring webmaster or entrepreneur, this blog post will show you my journey from where it began to where it is now.

This blog post describes:

Who I am and my background (or what I did before this) Where it all started: why I became a webmaster What has been done so far: progress and some recent events Important lessons learned on my journey to internet success (and there have been many!) How stubborn I can be sometimes! Some of my favorite posts on this site and other influential blogs that helped me along the way. Some people who have helped me along the way, or whom I respect as bloggers who offer value to those who read their sites. What is yet to come for this blog.

I hope you enjoy reading this post. If it inspires or helps you in any way, please leave a comment. I'd love to hear from you. This has been my road so far. It's fun sharing it with you.

WHO AM I AND WHERE IT ALL BEGAN

I'm a (male) student at the University of Alberta in Canada (go 'Dinos!). My major is environmental science with a focus on resource management and my minor is business administration. I have been a competitive swimmer since I was three-years-old and have been swimming for 22 years. In 2010, I became an open water swimmer and have swum in many distances up to 30km (18.6 miles), including the English Channel, Big Bay Lake, and Lake Ontario to name a few. It's a long story, but my main goal now is to qualify for the Antarctica Marathon Swim in March 2012.

A few months ago I started this blog because of my swimming hobby. I like writing about my experiences and helping others who are also getting into open water swimming or just want to learn some valuable lessons from someone who has done it before them. I didn't expect that I would end up running a successful blog that receives about 1,000 unique visitors per day and bringing in a few hundred dollars of income per month – not bad for only three months worth of time and effort!

I run this site on a VPS (Virtual Private Server) at Cabinet Host through WordPress. It's a shared hosting plan that costs less than $20 per month (it has unlimited bandwidth, too!) and it has been quite reliable so far through my first two months of usage. As time goes on, if traffic grows or if more resources are required to support the increasing number of posts, videos, etc., I might have to upgrade.

Conclusion: It's been great to have this site get underway so quickly and it's great knowing that there are people out there who are interested in what I have to say.

WHERE IT ALL BEGAN: WHY I BECAME A WEBMASTER

I wanted to start a blog about open water swimming so that I could improve my knowledge of the sport (yes, even though it is my hobby) and hopefully share some of my beginner mistakes with others and prevent them from doing the same. Of course, writing about open water swimming didn't make sense as a standalone blog, because there would be very little traffic or usefulness for others. Therefore, I needed to create a site around it by adding other topics related to swimming.