From hobby to a steady five-figure income
\nhttp:\/\/www.nst.com.my\/Current_News\/NST\/Friday\/National\/20070511085449\/Article\/index_html
\n SAMSUL Zamzuri Abu Bakar, 32, gets puzzled looks whenever he tells people about his profession.
\nHe blogs, but for most people, blogging is a hobby, not a job. The economics graduate also does marketing but his neighbours don’t see him leaving home smartly dressed to meet clients with briefcase in hand, like most marketers.
\nIn fact, Samsul Zamzuri is often at his home in Sungai Buloh. He is one of a small but rising number of Malaysians who earns an income solely through the Internet.
\nIt started off in 2003 as a hobby for the technology enthusiast, then working as an internal auditor. His first website offered free downloands of software allowing Windows-run computers to have a Apple Macintosh interface. Both are rival operating systems.
\n“After a while, my friend suggested I put up advertisements there. I signed up with Google Adsense and my first US$100 (RM350) cheque came six months later,” said Samsul Zamzuri. As he devoted more time online, traffic to his website soared \u2014 and so did his income.
\nBy 2005, while earning about RM2,000 from his day job, Samsul Zamzuri was already chalking up between RM7,000 and RM8,000 in advertising fees from his stable of websites and blogs.
\nIn August that year, he took the drastic decision of quitting his job to focus on his online ventures.
\nNow, he owns more than 15 websites and earns a five-figure salary. Some of the websites are on gadgets like handphones and digital cameras. He hires bloggers from countries like the United States, New Zealand and Ecuador.
\nSamsul Zamzuri bears the costs of running the websites and shares the profits with his partners. All his marketing (to get companies to advertise) is done online.
\nHis top revenue earners are directory websites where companies pay to get listed, and are then ranked higher in search engine results.
\nHis number two money-earner is his first website (www.osx-e.com), the one which got him hooked into online forays in the first place. Samsul Zamzuri claimed he had been offered up to US$20,000 for the website, but declined the bid for sentimental reasons.<\/p>\n
His advice for those who want to follow in his footsteps?
\n“When you start, don’t think of making money first. Treat it like a hobby. Be patient and hard working. The rewards are sweet.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
From hobby to a steady five-figure income http:\/\/www.nst.com.my\/Current_News\/NST\/Friday\/National\/20070511085449\/Article\/index_html SAMSUL Zamzuri Abu Bakar, 32, gets puzzled looks whenever he tells people about his profession. He blogs, but for most people, blogging is a hobby, not a job. The economics graduate also does marketing but his neighbours don’t see him leaving home smartly dressed to meet clients […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[24],"class_list":["post-194","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-techstuff","tag-mic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=194"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}