Friday 30 May 2008

Introduction

OK, cards on the table. I've never blogged before so I've no idea how this is going to go.

I've decided to start a blog about my activities as a guy who tries to make a bit of money online in what is euphamyistically known as my spare time but which is in reality just about every evening and some time at the weekends.

I've been doing this for ten years now and current manage three sites. I'll add links to them once I'm more used to how this all works.

My main site is Global Affiliate Programs. This is a directory of affiliate programs and I launched the site in August 2000. At the time there weren't any UK based affiliate directories and the UK web was just taking off. The idea was to provide a resource for UK webmasters in a similar way to that provided for US webmasters by the other directories that were around then.

One of the reasons for starting this blog is that I would like to interact with the users of Global Affiliate Programs to find out if its really hitting the mark. Up till now I've measured its success privately by seeing how many affiliates I refer to each program or network but because I refuse to partake in email marketing, or spam to use its correct title I've never set up a mailing list, not even a proper join-in not non-join-out one. This blog is intended to fill that rather obvious void so if you have something to say please say it.

My secondary site is Sleep Easy Loans which is a meta search engine focusing on the UK personal Financial Services sector. I set this site up about four years ago with the help of my good friend Toby who can do far more technical stuff online than I can. It has never really taken off in the way I hoped it would.

The third site is Cathie's Cars which is not really mine but I manage its content for a friend of mine. Cathie's Cars is the best minicab company the Epsom and Ewell area and the site allows people to book cabs online. This is very useful as Epsom is about halfway between Heathrow and Gatwick airports and a lot of their business is picking up people who are flying in.

I don't want this to be too long so I'll just say a little bit about myself and see if this can go online.
My name is George (obviously); I'm 46, live with my partner, have four children of my own, (3 with my ex and 1 with my partner) and 1 step-son. Next baby is expected in November so expect soppy photos to appear about then.

I'll be posting about whatever I like. I tend to be a bit bolshie and have views on just about everything so this isn 't going to be limited to webmasters stuff.

Enjoy the ride.

George