Name of your website?AtHomeandOutdoors.com
Your name?
Roberta Johnson
Your Location (city, etc)
Genoa
Please give us a short summary of your website.
AtHomeandOutdoors.com carries high quality name brand home decorating items and ideas, decorating tips and tricks, products for entertaining family and friends in style at home, great indoor and outdoor recreation and sports gear. Visit us today!
What inspired you to launch your own website?
We wanted to get away from the day to day grind of the typical rat race routine, to increase our income and get set for retirement.
When did you launch your first website, and what was it?
AtHomeandOutdoors.com is our first website!
How did you decide on a name for your website?
We love to entertain inside and outside, and we wanted to sell items that we would buy (or have purchased) ourselves. We also wanted a name that would be broad enough to cover our interests both indoors and outdoors. At Home and Outdoors started as major 'categories' and then became our website name and logo!
What makes your website different from other, similar offerings?
One's home should be their refuge from this crazy world. We focus on making the family comfortable first - decorating and furnishing the home, adding some joy and peace, and then adding other products that make it fun to entertain guests.
What is your eventual goal? (To sell it, keep it for income, secure a book or other mainstream media deal?)
We plan to keep the site for the next 15-20 years, and hand it down to our kids as we retire.
How does your investment of time and money balance against your success?
There are a lot of new challenges to conquer, new knowledge to gain, new methods of doing things, and yes, a fair amount of money to invest. All in all, it has been a great trade. We now have a permanent way of making money that is not dependant on any boss's good humor, there is no commute, and the more effort and thought we put into it, the better the payoff.
If you had an unlimited development budget, how would you change your site?
Videos...lots of them!
If your site got really big, really quickly, would you be able to keep up with the demand?
Absolutely yes! We live in a fairly economically poor area, and there are lots of good people looking for work. It would be very easy to hire and train a great staff. As far as workspace goes, there are also a fair number of empty buildings available that could serve as an office, order processing center and shipping facility.
What unexpected costs and headaches have you had to deal with?
Hmmm...headaches come mostly when we are trying to ramp up quickly on a new marketing method. Learning all the new terminology and the how-tos are definitely a challenge. The costs...well, those are going to be different for every site. It depends on the decisions you make - so go into every decision with as much info as you can gather!
What has been your biggest challenge?
Our biggest challenge so far has been to learn how to effectively market on the internet. It is quite different from traditional marketing methods, and requires constant testing and monitoring.
What method has been most successful for promoting your website?
The best methods we have tried to date has been listing the site in directories such as this one and writing hub pages with links.
How has running your website differed from your expectations?
There is a lot more trial and error than we expected with regard to keywords. We expected to test products more, but we find we are spending more time testing keywords in our marketing efforts.
How long have you run the site already, and how long will you continue to keep it up if you don't enjoy big gains in traffic, income or popularity?
We're in this for the long haul. We plan to continue steadily increasing our marketing efforts, testing products, and building the business. We expect gains in traffic, income and brand building to come slowly and steadily, but come they will!
What is your website address?
AtHomeandOutdoors.com
