I started MZerak.com website/blog to document my path to making passive income online, which enabled me to quit a rat race and to build my own business.
I also want to help as many of you as I can to start living your dream of being your own boss through online business.
Just watch this great inspirational video:
Are you ready to hustle?
There is no reason that you can’t do the same as I do and did.
Furthermore, you can exceed my accomplishments easily.
Table of Contents
About me
I’m Matjaz Zerak, 37 years old from a small country in Europe called Slovenia.
Slovenia, not Slovakia 😉
And my fortune (or misfortune) is that I had graduated Informatics and Technologies of Communication.
So I’m not a complete code monkey, but I know a thing or two about programming.
I was blessed with an intriguing mind, and I always want to see a big picture like how and why someone will be using any app or software.
Something you will need if you want to understand how SEO works.
These days I make a living from passive online income.
But it wasn’t always like this.
My background
I started playing with flash, websites made with HTML and CSS, and then jumped on PHP.
Through college, I earned a few bucks by building websites (small, big, web-shops, etc. using Joomla and later WordPress) and by doing that fell into a world of SEO.
Almost every client wanted to rank first on Google 🙂
Who doesn’t, right?
And because the NOT paying for service (yes, you read right: NOT PAYING) is Slovenian #1 sport I quickly realized that’s better I do SEO for myself than for clients.
My first niche site
I stumbled upon Pat Flynn’s case study about AdSense niche sites.
And when I saw that income reports, I was hooked.
I don’t have to earn as much as he does, although it would be nice 🙂
And so my first AdSense niche site was born.
When I now look back, I see I was a total amateur.
It’s a miracle I made and still making income from that site.
It’s not even mobile-optimized yet 🙂
No niche research, no clear plan.
I just picked a health topic that interested me at that time and started writing.
But I was learning and evolving.
My first Amazon Affiliate site
I can’t remember if there was some influencer that opened my eyes to Amazon niche sites, but I do remember Spencer Haws and his case study on that topic.
And I was hooked even more this time.
I know that people hate clicking on ads, and that click rate is dropping, etc.
And this was something different, something new for me.
You offer visitor (who is in buying mode 🙂 ) relevant information about the product that he’s already searching for; he clicks on your affiliate link, and you get a 24h cookie.
And you earn a commission if he buys any product on Amazon.
Of course you need to be accepted into Amazon Associates program.
And beside all the pros of being an Amazon Affiliate there are also cons like huge Amazon TOS and closed Amazon Associates Accounts without any prior warning.
And my first Amazon niche site was born.
Again not enough research in the first and my opinion crucial step: selecting the niche.
I jumped in the sub-niche of home decor products.
As you all might know, it takes months to rank a site in Google (now even longer with Google’s Sandbox).
But with adding new content, backlinking and building social signals, a site started to rank, and income increased.
But in the off-season, I found out I have selected seasonal niche, meaning that site earns in season and almost nothing in off-season.
Lesson learned 🙂
But the site still ranks and still brings income but just 4-5 months in a year.
With that lesson learned (avoid seasonal niches), I started another Amazon niche site.
And as before in another sub-niche of home decor products.
With some more research into a niche, I’m entering.
Fast forward a few years, and I have a portfolio of 10+ amazon affiliate sites and ARTEnet.es – one of the largest Spanish marketplaces for promotion of original artworks with ARTEnet shop selling prints of originals.
All of them making money.
Some more than others.
So what will I publish on my website?
I want to record what I do and be transparent as much as I can.
I learned and still am learning from blogs/websites like this (from people that are much longer in SEO as I am), that show what and how they do.
And I want to give back and show my readers, subscribers, how they can do the same.
It’s not easy, and it’s not getting rich overnight scheme, it’s many hours of tweaking and writing content, always learning, evolving to Google algorithm changes, etc.
But it’s easy when you know you are working for yourself.
It’s easy when you have a clear goal and vision in mind.
It’s easy if you see a whole picture or blueprint which you can follow.
And it’s sweet when you know you can do this and leave you 9-5 work behind.
If you already started your online money making the journey, I hope you can learn something from my experience or failures.
And to motivate you if you are like most of the people just thinking: “Ooh, I could do that too…” and finding excuse after excuse as to why you didn’t start yet.
Join my newsletter and get notified when I publish something interesting.
I promise I won’t spam you.
Cheers,
Matjaz