In my previous WealthMountains Issue 3 (Sep 05), I shared with you a successful Intenet concept that had taken the Internet by the storm.

Back in Sep 05, the site owner Alex Tew (21 year old) earned US$143,000 with this simple concept. Within a short span of less than 4 months, he had hit the target revenue of $1 million. Check out his site at Million Dollar Homepage. His simple concept is that he will rent out spots on this site for a small fee of $1 for each pixel (1 pixel = 1 small dot on your screen). Each of this spot is guarantee to be online for at least 5 years.

To his customers, this represents a tremendous savings considering the exposure that they will get over 5 years. Hence, the site was a run-away success. Word-of-mouth support has also aided in its explosure. In Robert Cialdini's Influence: Science & Practice (which I strongly recommend you read up), Alex marketed his website based on the principles of:

• social proof
• likings

Anyway, back to this simple concept of selling pixel. With the success and publicity given to Alex's site, he had attracted the unwanted attention of extortionists who knocked the site over with a massive denial-of-service attack. Alex was ransomed a few times. Police were called in. To cut the story short, Alex did not pay the ransom. Several counter-measures were taken. You can read the full story at "Blackmailers target $1m website".

So what can we learn from this?

We can gain 3 lessons from this. You might want to think about it when rolling out your Internet Business:

• Lesson 1: Spread your eggs into mutliple baskets
  As you grow more successful, setup multiple websites to sell your products (or earn commisions from affiliates/Google program). Don't leave all your products on 1 page. If that website goes down, so does your whole business. I had enough horrors stories to know that we need to take preventive-measures for this.
  
  
• Lesson 2: Where possible, do not reveal your complete earnings online
  Usually when you reveal your COMPLETE earnings online, you invite the unwanted attentions. If you are earning big bucks, they will know that you are a target that can pay. Alex was ransomed $50,000 multiple times.
  
  
• Lesson 3: Do not release your trade secret too soon
  The script that had made "Million Dollar Homepage" so successful was made available to public shortly after it was launched. This has created multiple other similar websites. Instead, Alex should have waited until he hit his minimum target before releasing the script.

The above 3 lessons are not comprehensive but by using them, you would go a further way to protect your success in the online world.

About the Author:
Keith Choy runs the WealthMountains portal which offers tips, tools and news on path to multiple streams of income. To get the latest news, do signup for his WealthMountains eZine at http://www.wealthmountains.com/news.htm.