About Me
Who am I?
My name is Tyler Cruz and I’m a web publisher and entrepreneur. I make my living by creating and building websites and selling advertising on them. I also occasionally dabble in other online entrepreneurial areas such as domain and website flipping and domain brokering.
I’m 23-years old and reside on the beautiful island of Vancouver Island, in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.
How and when did I start web publishing?
While I had created a number of sites before starting to make money from them, they were only stepping stones, and usually only constructed as hobby sites or for personal and practical purposes such as for my gaming clan, friends, my local library, etc.
My first major site was Movie-Vault.com. I had spent countless hours of designing, programming, and content-building and maintaining on the site, and managed to get a dozen or two volunteer movie critics to submit reviews to the site. I had experimented with monetizing a site before, by signing up to Amazon’s affiliate program and getting paid on a CPC basis for their banners, but that had never brought in more than a dollar or two each month.
However, since Movie-Vault.com was growing fast and had decent traffic, I actually saw myself make $45 one month. This whetted my appetite, and it was then, using FastClick, that I had realized the money-making potential of websites. Before then, I had never associated websites with money. Now I can’t think otherwise!
After I started to make $100, $200, $300 and more a month with Movie-Vault, I started to really expand my portfolio of sites and try out new ideas.
How much do I make?
Since I make the majority of my money from private advertisers, my income is never ’steady’. I therefore calculate my earnings on a 6-month average basis, recalculating quarterly. As of Jan 1st, 2007, I’m averaging $256 USD a day. This is before taxes.
This figure does not include other supplementary income I earn online such as domain buying and selling, brokering, website flipping, etc.
On February 13th, 2007, I received a cheque for $23,000 for successfully brokering somebody else’s domain.
What are my work/financial goals?
Website-wise, I’d like to own 3-4 monster (large) websites, with at least two in different niches for market stability. I’d also like to expand on my existing network of contacts. Having good contacts in various fields relating to the Internet is immensely valuable.
Financially-wise, I’d like to own a number of assets outside of the web, and earn money from both websites and other assets such as stocks, bonds, etc. I may also be interested in purchasing more real estate.
To be honest though, I’m perfectly happy with what I’m making now. However, I’d consider myself extremely happy if I could bring in a consistent $25,000-$30,000 a month from my websites. That’d be enough to help me be financially independent for the rest of my life.
What are your hobbies and interests aside from web publishing?
I love watching movies. It’s hard to beat turning off all the lights, popping in a newly released rented DVD, relaxing on the couch, and eating some grub. I play poker from time to time, although I used to play much more than i do now.
Occassionally I’ll get immersed into a computer game such as Starcraft or World of Warcraft and spend the majority of my time playing.
I’m also an avid MMA fan, enjoy TV shows such as LOST and Prison Break, and am absolutely in love with food. I go out to play badminton twice a week and spend time with my girlfriend.
Where did your inspirational flash video go?
In April of 2006 I had commissioned an inspirational video to be made on my newfound success at that time. I’ve kept a link here as I get requests from people who still like to watch it. Please note that the video is very dated though; it was made in April 2006.
For those still interested in viewing it, you can do so by clicking here.
