I bought the address, www.HowToTeachEnglishOnline.com so check out the new and improved blog. I will write all of my future posts on that site. I wish you all the best, and come on over to my new site and discover just how you can teach English on the Internet (online) and make money.

Just an online English teacher making money,

John Buchanan

Click here to buy a lesson.

Your website is the keystone, so without it your attempt at English teaching success will fail. You must, must, must have a website to offer English lessons or conversations on the Internet. Keep in mind, your website doesn’t need to be state-of-the-art, and it doesn’t have to employ Web 2.0 functionalities (if you don’t know what that means, don’t worry about it).

Whether you have experience with website making or not, that’s not important. All you need is a presence, and you don’t have to seem “sophisticated” in your site’s “look.” Don’t focus too much on eye-candy. There are a lot of free sites out there that will teach you and/or help you to make a decent website that will be attractive enough to make you some money. It’s not a big deal, so don’t focus and fret too much about your site (but it is essential that you at least have one).

Let’s take a look at two sites that will give you free tools to create and host a darn nice site. By the way, I use a paid hosting plan ONLY because I enjoy the creation and process of making my own website. It gives me satisfaction; I really enjoy it. But! But! But you don’t have to go this route if you don’t want to. The new Internet is so ready for people who don’t want to pay anything to have powerful tools at their disposal! Let’s get started.

Free Websites:

This is my first site that uses WordPress, and WOW, I am very impressed. You can create a nice look! Check out their features. Here’s the quick list:

1. It Takes Seconds and is Free!

2. Dozens of Gorgeous Themes

3. Categorize and Tag Your Posts

4. Spell-check, Previews, Autosave, Words, Photos, Videos

5. Lots of Privacy Options, including Members-Only Blog

6. Integrated Stats System

7. Automatic Spam Protection

8. Import from Blogger, TypePad, LiveJournal, and More

9. Great Help If You Need It

10. A Great Blogging Community

11. Easily Track Followups to your Comments

12. Sidebar Widgets for Flickr, del.icio.us, Meebo, and More

13. Manage Regular Pages, not Just Blog Posts

14. Export

15. Multiple Blogs and Multiple Authors

16. No Rebuilding

17. Very Fast and Reliable Service

18. Advertising

Another way to put together a free website is with FreeWebs. This site looks pretty comprehensive, and it appears as though it’s easy to use (it’s WYSIWYG). I will test it out later and give a more informed opinion about it. If you’re interested, take the tour and get started. I have a feeling that this might be better than WordPress for your site, but let me confirm this. I will sign-up today, create a site, and then I will talk about it tomorrow or the next day. Stay tuned!

Okay now, if you’re serious about making money by teaching English on the Internet, then you need to prove it to yourself right now. Go to one of these 2 sites and sign up now. If you’re nervous about making a website, I understand, but it’s so much easier than you think. If you need any help, just ask me; that’s why I’m here!

For my next blog entry, I will talk about FreeWebs and the whole creation process. I will also tell you the basics of what you’ll need as far as content. You don’t need much. Remember the K.I.S.S. rule (Keep It Simple Silly). Less is more. Good luck my fellow online English teachers!

Sincerely,

John D Buchanan
EnglishKitty.com

I have a dream. In fact, I’ve had the same dream for a long time. When I was in college, I had this crazy notion that I could actually make money on the Internet. I wasn’t sure how I was going to do it, but I had the intention of getting rich.

So after letting my sub-conscience do its thing, it told me to write a book about my art school experiences. That’s right, I’m an art major. I went to Herron School of Art, IUPUI (in Indiana) and majored in painting, and I graduated in 2003 (but I’m 32 years old; I didn’t start until 1998).

Anyway, I convinced myself to write a book on my experiences and suggestions about art school and then sell the book via “publishing on demand” and an e-book on the Internet from a website that I would make.

As it turned out, I only sold my books to my mother and father. I did not make one cent from a stranger. Wow! That was such an eye-opening experience.

So what did I learn? I learned a lot about website building and marketing. I taught myself DreamWeaver. I also bought and read a lot of e-books about Internet marketing. So I had the tools and the know-how, but I didn’t have a product that people wanted. I had misjudged my market. There was just no demand.

So now let’s fast-forward to 2005. I moved to Osaka, Japan, and I started working for a big English conversation school. I worked in the section that conducted lessons/conversations over the Internet. This experience gave me the idea that I too could teach English lessons and conversations over the Internet via my own personal business. And the start-up and overhead costs were virtually FREE!

It made total sense. I could teach English to not only Japan but the WORLD!

I found an opportunity in which I had the know-how (Internet teaching experience and Internet marketing), and I knew that there were paying customers hungry for English. My English school/company that I worked for charges anywhere between 20 to 50 dollars a lesson! That’s a 40-minute lesson for which Japanese people are paying to speak to a native English speaker. (And I am by no means a professional on grammar; you don’t need to be!!! I’m an art major!)

I realized that people were willing to pay a lot of money just to speak to native English speakers. So I put together a website, downloaded Skype, did some free advertising and BAM, I was ready!

And it didn’t take long until I found my first paying student from Korea. I couldn’t believe it! I finally did it! I offered a service on the Internet, and I made money. I continued to do this month after month, and I became more popular.

I’ve averaged about 500 bucks each month, and my record month was about $1,500, and I really believe I could make more once I quit my job next month. Then I will have tons of time to increase my student load (plus I can share my journey with you).

So now I want to start teaching teachers how to make money, and if I get enough readers to this blog, then I will add some sponsors, so hopefully you will check them out thus helping me a bit. Thanks in advance!

Good luck! Work hard! And you too can make money on the Internet by speaking English! If you have any questions or suggestion for me along your journey, please feel free to contact me at verycoolwinter@yahoo.com.

Peace,

John D Buchanan

Motivation! OMG! Where is it! Please, let me find it…

Do you ever think like this? I used to, but I came to realize that motivation is a crazy little number. The best way to “find it” is to just act. An object in motion stays in motion. That’s all I’m going to say about that. So if you want to start making some crazy money by teaching English online, then you’ll need to stay in motion.

You’ll need to stay motivated.

Let me suggest you come here often, check out my ideas, leave comments. Let’s create a community of English teachers who want to work for themselves by teaching English in their underwear. Oh yeah, it is possible. I’ve taught lessons with Skype after I just rolled out of bed. In some cases I never left my bed (it’s wise not to use your web camera in this case, and if you do you should charge double or less depending on how you look).

Any who, once you make your first sale, your motivation, inspiration, and all of those happy little energizing feelings will explode! Pow! Bang! Boom! You can do it. It’s so easy to make money. Your competition is pretty minimal right now. So you need to establish yourself now before the big bad boom of online English teachers take over.

I’ll be your guru, your guide, your idea man on making upwards of $25.00 or more an hour (but I only teach 50 minute lessons). It’s so great, so come often, share any ideas, and let’s all get rich by teaching English online with the likes of Skype, Yahoo Messenger, MSN Messenger, Google Talk or whatever.

Your Online English Teaching Guru,

John D Buchanan
EnglishKitty.com