by Steve on September 2, 2010
I have been trying to decide on my next stock play to diversify my portfolio even further.
Looking through technology companies and trying to decide on who to buy has been difficult. I really like so many companies from (GOOG) google with their new android phone and powerful intellectual base of employees. Netflix has also interested me as I see many flocking to their service to help reduce cable tv bills and the masses wanting to dump cable and go to using the internet with a movie subscription service like Netflix.

There are just so many cool technology stocks out there. I have always loved Apple Computer or Apple Inc. as they are now called since they are in so many industries now other than just computers. Apple Stock is what many people think is high or overvalued. I kept looking at it hard and realize there could be some market downside with this stock at almost $250 a share.
Most individual investors won’t think about buying at these prices. But I think even if we see a market down turn, the upside potential is much higher over the next few years and here is why.
Apple to me is my China play. They have 2 Apple Stores in China and I feel will continue to grow rapidly in this fast pace economy. They also are revolutionizing many industries and are the most innovative company around. There are many copy cats and everybody wants to copy Apple which increases competition, but they always seem to take the lead and dominate.
I really like the new idea of Apple TV and the social networking ideas of iTunes that they have just recently announced. Upgrades of the iPod and many other aspects of their business just has huge potential growth.
This company has an awesome balance sheet with no long term debt and cash galore. I think APPL is just too good of a company not to have it in my portfolio. I buy all Apple products and have the Apple iMacs, iPhones and am wanting to buy the new Apple TV device. I use their products and have fallen in love with all of their stuff.
Yes there are competitors out there, but I am sticking with Apple. I like the continual excitement of the company and Steve Jobs the CEO. The company is well managed and believe has a long term plan to thrive an excel for the long term. This is why I am adding Apple to My Portfolio and will accumulate on the dips.
I am only buying 10 shares and will update My Portfolio with the transaction performed this morning over the next couple of days. I got it at around 248 a share as it dipped a bit lower this morning. I am happy with the purchase and think this could be cheap compared to where this stock could end up.
My strategy would be if Apple does drop is to hold and buy more. I think it is a great time to get in the stock now at this price or lower as the stock was up to around 280 not too long ago and think it could easily pass the 300 a share mark.
More on Apple Inc. in later posts and you can always visit My Portfolio Page to see all of my stocks and the live portfolio.
by Steve on September 1, 2010
This article is about How to Buy a Website. It is much more than that though as I will explain why sometimes it is smarter just to buy an existing website and how to go about doing it.
Starting From Scratch is Hard
One of the main reasons why I think it is smart to buy an existing website or domain name is that it is so hard to start from scratch. An example is my blog at MakingAMillionDollars.com. I have had this domain name for a couple years, but didn’t really know what I wanted to do with it. I decided to restart this blog from scratch and add great content for people to learn about personal finances, investing and making money online.
Because I am starting from scratch and have only been out there a few months I am a Google Page Rank Zero. My Alexa Rank is also up there pretty high, but I hope to change that over the next year. It is tough and I am doing my best to write great content for the readers of this blog. I want you bloggers and webmaster’s to add me to your blog rolls and link back to us, because you really like what we are writing and our content is something you want to send your readers to.
My point is that starting from scratch can be difficult and very time consuming to build traffic, get link backs. You have to work at it when establishing a new internet presence.
Buying an existing website or blog can immediately get you traffic, a high PR and Alexa Rank and an established Domain Name.
Immediate Source of Income
When you buy an existing website you also can verify the income that the site is making and determine based on what you will pay for that site what your return on investment will be and how many years or months it will take to pay itself off. Instead of waiting to build up enough traffic to your startup, you will have an established site with traffic that can be an immediate source of revenue.
Improve and Redesign
If you identify a website or blog you would like to buy and see it has a bad design or areas that need improvement, then make it better. You can either hire a web designer to relayout the site to make it easier to navigate as well as to make it more SEO or Search Engine Optimized to get indexed in Google and the other search engines.
This will increase the traffic to your newly purchased website and over time increase the revenue the site is making.
Monetizing The Website
There are many really great websites out there that drive generous amounts of traffic, but are not making squat! If you learn how to monetize a website with Google Adsense, Affiliate Programs or Ebooks you can immediately make more money. You will find that many website designers are great at the concept and creating traffic, but have missed the boat on monetization.
This is where you can come in and by modifying the site a bit, can generate double or triple the income.
Flipping Websites
Another idea is to Buy a Website and have a vision for it. Redesign or increase the profit and traffic for that site over a 6 – 12 month period and then flip it. You can potentially make thousands doing this. It is kind of like flipping real estate with less risk.
Where Can I Buy Websites?
A great place to start researching and looking for websites is Flippa.com. I have bought 4 different websites off of Flippa. In future posts I will go into the mechanics of bidding, evaluation and actually doing the transaction of moving the domain, database and website to become your internet property.
My son actually handled the mechanics of it. He also redesigned the websites to make them much cleaner and nicer in regard to graphics and layout. I will save this discussion for future posts.
Do you see how this can be advantageous by buying an existing website?