hey what's up duck Huntington for niche
site project in this interview I talked
to Dom Wells from human proof designs
dumbs a friend of mine from when I got
started online back in 2013 so we talked
about how Dom got started online we
talked about you know sort of what he is
working on now he has more of a service
based business in some ways and we
talked about how he structures his team
so let's just get over to the interview
right now hey what's up depending tenir
from niche site project with my good
friend Dom how are you doing today
yeah really appreciate it you know I
think it's the first time on the channel
but you and I have known each other for
a while you've guest posted a niche I
project I think I've guessed posted with
you and then I've been on your podcast a
few times too so I think if people
follow us around they've probably seen
us
you know brushing shoulders in the past
but some people may not know who you are
an intro like who you are where you're
from what you're working on sure yeah
so I'm Dom Wells the owner founder of
human proof designs
I guess my online journey started 2012
just building sites and affiliate
marketing and everything like that style
human proof designs in 2013
very late 2013 and we basically just
offer services for other people who do
affiliate marketing so we build websites
for them and all of the things that are
relevant to that like link building
articles and yeah where I'm from I'm
from the UK but I'm rarely there so cool
cool and so would you call yourself I
mean you're obviously location and
dependent just because I know you from
before so I know you could work from
anywhere in the nature of your business
but would you call yourself like a
digital nomad not really I was talking
to someone recently actually and they
said no they asked me the same question
and I kind of described my lifestyle and
they came back and said oh you're more
of a slow mad and I don't know if that's
a thing or if he just made it up on the
fly but I was like yeah I think that
suits it so for me it's like over the
last two years I spent about 11 months
in Canada and
I spent this summer so summer 2017 in
London and then I've just spent a month
in Thailand and moving back to Taiwan at
the end of the year so yeah
location-independent definitely digital
nomad not really I just kind of I like
to go somewhere and stay there for a few
months and write and we'll do some work
I was gonna say well dig into your
business shortly but I mean to really
like run a team like grow the business
you can't be running around worrying
about like where you're gonna stay you
need to have a stable internet
connection and all that stuff and be
able to concentrate so I can totally
relate to what you're talking about
there a lot of people probably have seen
human approved designs but like what was
your career before you got into internet
marketing and stuff so I was teaching
English in Taiwan just working in a
language school and it was okay but
there's you kind of hit the ceiling
quite quickly because you know like you
only have to work 30 hours a week and
you can end 1,500 to 2,000 us a month an
entire one that goes quite a long way
right you're still going to be doing
that five or ten years later like it's
not like you're gonna be promoted to
running a school or anything so yeah
like that's why I started looking at
other things cool did you try anything
else or how did you get into like
internet marketing niche sites and all
that yeah I guess I kind of stumbled
around and I started reading different
things and you know I read the Rich Dad
Poor Dad books like a lot of people
probably did and I read I ended up
reading 4-hour workweek and it's
interesting cuz 4-hour workweek for me
it wasn't really much of a blueprint I
mean he does give a blueprint but for me
I kind of I wasn't able to replicate
what he says to do in that book but it
kind of awakened me to the possibilities
but I've actually spoken to other people
who said it was a blueprint and they
pretty much copied it exactly say Wow
yeah I guess you know I I didn't get
anything directly either although I
didn't read the 4-hour workweek until
like three years ago so it was out for a
while by the time I got to it so I think
I mean when you and correct me if I'm
wrong
but the blueprint that he suggests is in
general it's a drop shipping situation
right like yeah basically I know he has
a lot of other ideas tim ferriss of
course has a lot of other ideas in there
and i have all his books I really like
Tim Ferriss but yeah I think like there
was probably a window where that worked
really well I was like way more
competitive nowadays because you know
the books been out for a while so do you
have any like big takeaways from the
4-hour workweek where you were just like
yeah like that did open your eyes I
think the biggest thing is probably
niche just the concept of a niche
because I think it was something along
the lines of you know better to be a big
fish in a small pond than a small fish
in a big pond and I'm sure well I
assumed him didn't come up with that
concept and he didn't coin that
expression but for me that was the real
you know that's where kind of like niche
marketing or just picking a niche came
from and the other thing is something
that a lot of people seem to forget
about and he talks about your business
or your niche as your muse and like it's
very much like a lifestyle business type
thing so I don't think at any point in
the book he says to create a business
around your passion it's more about
creating a business to fund your passion
so right you know he's like I want to go
and live in Japan and figure out how to
cheat that kind of food I don't want to
you know like build a business about
that I just want to be able to do that
so I'll build a business that funds that
and that's how I always approached
affiliate marketing and I'd I guess it's
because of the influence of that book
and a lot of people do in my opinion the
wrong way just trying to build a site
around their passion instead great
interesting good takeaway so moving on
to I know a lot of people are super
interested in affiliate marketing in
general niche sites versus Authority
sites and all that stuff we'll just
assume affiliate marketing and we won't
even get into that portion of it but the
timeline for success so let's say you
know for example someone buys a site
from Hugh
proof designs maybe one of the the
premium level the the flagship type
sights like what kind of timeline would
we see over say 12 months or so tell me
about the traffic and the revenue that
someone could expect in the time
investment or other monetary investment
that they may need to make as well yeah
I mean it's totally different for every
person but sure to give it to give a
general rule I guess you know normally
when people ask me how long it's going
to take to earn some decent money and
again everyone's got a different
definition of that I usually try and say
a year because while many people have
done it sooner I want them to kind of I
want them to have the right mentality
going into it of course you can make
money a lot sooner than that and you can
make it in six months but I feel like a
year's the point where a site really
starts to make decent money like it
could be a thousand dollars a month or
it could be five thousand so the months
in between that I just kind of well the
first few months are very like torture I
guess you do a lot of work and don't see
any results although the results are
coming but you know like something you
do today you're not going to find out
whether it works for five months or four
months right and it doesn't really
happen in a linear fashion either
because your keywords could all be on
page two and you're getting no traffic
and then one day all your keywords are
on page one and suddenly you've got five
ten thousand visits a month so I kind of
find it problematic to answer that
question with like definite answer
definite no this this good man because I
get that question I don't know about
every single day and yeah there's too
many variables involved and you know the
kind of answer that I give is pretty
close to what you mentioned sometimes I
like to say like tell me if you agree
like maybe within six months you may
have your first $100 a month and you
know you may not it could be four months
it could be seven months but around that
time period and then like you said it's
not linear so you fast forward to like
month nine through twelve
perhaps it's at $900 or it could be like
2000 if it happens
like a perfect storm of like good
products good timing during the year
seasonality whatever it may be so would
you agree with that or am i taken yeah
I'd say so every every actual time is
different like yeah like you say one guy
could make a hundred dollars in a month
and the next person it takes a year to
get to that point but I think the things
that they always have in common is
whatever however long it takes to get
from 0 to 100 it's probably going to
take less time to get from 100 to like
500 or even a thousand because once
things starts it's get traction then
it's a lot faster cool and it's like the
compound effect compound interest and
you put all that effort in and it does
pay off snowball effect and all that I
can't throw in any other analogies I
can't think of anymore but yeah if you
put in the effort it'll pay off so what
are some of the big mistakes that you
see say beginners make on maybe their
first couple sites I mean yeah I guess I
could go in a very high thing and talk
about mentality and people give up too
early because they think they don't see
any results or I could go very granular
and say publishing spam comments so yeah
I guess some of the common mistakes are
probably fiddling around with sites too
much so that could be someone who's
bought one of our sites or it could be
someone who's built their own site like
and we're all guilty of it but people
fret way too much over the theme or
whether this widgets in the right place
and that stuff's important but if you're
not getting like a thousand visits a
month it's irrelevant
giving up too early is probably the
biggest one and if you don't see results
then you know it's really hard to
motivate yourself and even if you tell
people that beforehand they're like yeah
got it but then five months later you
know something changes here's a common
question that I get and I just kind of
want to see what you'll say so I'm in a
kind of a hurry this is not me speaking
but a question so I'm kind of in a hurry
I really need to make money are there
any shortcuts that you could suggest for
like making money sooner on my
new site well yes and now I guess so I
mean when I kind of morally I want to
say no because I feel it's the wrong
attitude but yeah there's stuff you can
do like you can share your articles on
social media more aggressively than
someone else or if it's a site that has
decent Commission's you can do paid
traffic but that could end up backfiring
and you'd lose money faster so I feel
like if you approach this from I'm gonna
make money sooner or later I don't
really mind how long it takes as long as
I get there then that's the way to do it
but certainly there are some things that
you can do that don't just rely on SEO
and guest posting and stuff so got you
in like let's dive into that a little
bit so I basically don't do much on
social I suck at social I don't enjoy it
like on a personal level so I just stay
away from it cuz I don't enjoy it I just
stick to the organic SEO stuff so are
you deep into social have you seen that
sort of strategy work on on niche in you
know affiliate sites again yes and on
some of my standard Amazon portfolio
sites and some of these sites are quite
big but in my mind they're just Amazon
sites like maybe they've got fifty to a
hundred posts but I'm not interested in
sharing them socially because they're
basically they're like review posts or
how-to posts and that I don't feel
there's any real scope for sharing them
socially but then I've got a couple of
authority sites where social has been
huge I mean human proof designs was I
developed a lot of my initial authority
from sharing in facebook groups my team
and I have recently started a second
site like not relevant to human proof
designs at all
I just thought I've got a really good
team here I should build a second site
with them and that one I shared a post
in a Facebook group about four or five
days ago and it got 700 visits in 24
hour period just from one Facebook post
and one reddit the same article that I
just shared it on Reddit and Facebook
and that generated a bunch of
subscribers not that many subscribers
actually because I guess because social
traffic but it got me like 24 leads for
a product I
promoting on the article I guess the
takeaway from that is if it's something
where you can be a proper authority site
and not just like what people think is
an authority site which is like just a
big site then yeah I think that social
is well worth it but for the average
site it's probably not worth it but then
again if you're just trying to get your
first sale or your first two or three
sales late you want to pass the Amazon
approval thing could still be worth your
time it's just probably not very
scalable right okay that's a good way to
put it because I do hear a lot of people
you know they're really pushing social
but I think it only fits in certain
areas and that's especially like with
what we're talking about with affiliate
sites like if it's just a plain old
affiliate site with reviews I mean no
one actually really cares about it too
much
unless there's helpful information you
know yeah all right let's shift gears a
little bit and talk about like the
service side of your business so you
have I guess you have content you have
done for you sites you have some link
building stuff any other services that
you offer over there yeah I just will
put a link below so people can get get
to these easy what services do you have
and then like how'd you choose those
specific ones you mean why did we decide
to release those services yeah okay so
just to recap our main services are our
done-for-you sites and that could either
be we produce a list of sites every
month or niches every month and people
can hire us to build those sites or
people can come to us with an idea and
we'll build a site for them and then we
also do articles and some of them are
standalone like someone pays us we do 10
articles for them and then here you are
another one is a Monthly article version
where people pay us every month when we
upload articles to the site for them and
we can publish them for them or we can
just say okay they're up there you know
you hit publish when you're ready we
also do links and again links has a
standalone and a monthly option and we
can do keyword packs as well and then we
just have some training courses as well
so most of those services has come about
over the past year and it's mostly
because of our increased ability to
living those services for the first year
or two years or even three years people
would ask us to do these services like
they'd say hey like I'm gonna pay
someone for links I'd rather pay you can
you do links and I was torn because part
of me was like that I don't want me to
build the site for you and do links for
you because if it doesn't work out like
it's you're gonna blame me when it might
not necessarily be my fault but also I
was like I can't do a good enough job on
everything like we're really good at
sites but we're not where we good at
links but we can't do it to the level
that you would want us to but as my team
grew and I got a operations manager and
a lot of good systems in place we were
like actually yeah we can probably start
offering these now so we chose them
based on just demand really like it's a
mixture of what we knew people needed
and what people asked us to create got
it cool and how did you like fight the
urge to offer those services where
people have money they're telling you
they want to give it to you and I know a
lot of folks once they see a little bit
of success there's far more
opportunities open up they spread
themselves too thin really so how did
you prevent yourself from like going and
doing the link building stuff too soon
you know because originally maybe I
would say yes and then it wouldn't go so
well and I'd refund the customer because
I was like yeah this is not you know
where we've spread ourselves too thin
here I'm sorry
and also just advice from other
successful people when we were trying to
make a name for ourselves I guess like a
lot of the advice we got was to niche
down because it's a lot easier to think
of human proof designs as the guys that
do done through sites than it is to be
like you know they do everything whereas
once you've got that established
audience and brand it's a lot easier to
roll out side projects and stuff so it
was a mixture of telling myself that not
taking out everyone's money you know in
the long term it will pay off more and
also realizing that actually we were not
capable of doing it
yeah and I've definitely seen even
people that just like roll out their
first service business it doesn't scale
well as soon as you start adding people
your efficiency goes down you get more
customers your efficiency goes down like
it gets a little harder by the way how
many people are on your team at this
point so like full time I guess there's
about ten and there in terms of how many
active up work contracts we have that's
over 200 last so yeah those those people
are not full-time for us but like
they're also not like random one-off
freelancers they're people who we've
hired and we've trained them on our
systems and we give them work as it
comes in but they're probably also doing
other work for other people as well
Wow there's a lot of people so and I
take it most of those are writers the
vast majority of writers yeah okay cool
and then I guess how long did it take
you to scale to that I mean 10 full-time
people obviously is well that's a small
company at the beginning of 2015 I think
I hired my first person our heart book
so before that I was using like hire
writers or I writer to do the articles
and then I would be editing them myself
like proofreading them and I had a
friend who I knew who also did like
WordPress dev stuff who I had taken on
to do a lot of the site building for me
yeah I think probably from January 2015
to now which is December 2017 so pretty
much two years to scale from like me and
one or two people to juggernaut yeah got
it and do you have any tips for people
that are looking to get started with
like a service business and they want to
be able to scale in the future just
since you've had you know three plus
years of experience with it yeah I've
got probably too many tips to fit into
one video I think the hardest part of
scaling a service business is when
you're doing it yourself you know in the
beginning you're busy hustling to get
customers and then you get the customers
and you're like okay sweet and it's
payday and you get all this money so
then you're busy dealing with the
customers and suddenly there's no no
in your pipeline and the pipeline dries
up so you've gotta be able to have
margins where you can hire people to
actually fulfill the service so that you
can just focus on filling the pipeline
or if you prefer fulfilling the service
then you can hire someone to actually do
the sales so yeah it's a lot of hustling
at the beginning and part of the reason
we had to keep putting our prices up
over the years was because it was late
you know I can't I can't do everything
our customers want and grow the business
unless I can hire more people a big help
for me as well was hiring my operations
manager because I'm not a very good
manager and he is and he didn't really
know the business that well but he knew
he knew business he just didn't know our
business very well and he had a lot of
experience running a company with his
dad and so he was able to really put
legs on a lot of areas of the business
that like I was sort of struggling and
fighting fires and everything and so
having him was well well worth it as
well cool so let's shift again from the
the services over to Amazon affiliate
stuff so I've been getting a lot of
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