Hearty Surprise

Unbelievable? Interested to know what business she is upto ? A clue: This 17 year old minor who runs whateverlife.com that provides free myspace layout.  Did you guess who? Be introduced to Ashley Qualls who is the president of whateverlife.com who boldly quit school to run a million dollar business. Her initial investment is $8 for the domain name.

Ashley started the company in 2004 and by 2005 offered the do it yourself myspace layout for people to use. In less than 2 years time her layouts has become the rage of the teenagers.  It is reported that her site receives 7 millions visitors and 60 million page views per month. 

Her earnings is about $70,000/ pm and the best thing is  that the revenue is only through advertisement and nothing through the sale of her product, because her layouts are free. Imagine if she had offered her layout which are grabbed like hot cakes for a small prize. Now please hold on to your jaws. They are dropping.    Not many corporates who deal with her initially know that they are talking to a 17 year old who is not yet eligible to do business as per law.

Just take a look at recently done and todo list as of 20th Sep on her blog:

“… You may have seen me on CH 4 or CH 7 in the past few days if you live in the Detroit area! So that was fun! I just did a photoshoot for StrutMag.com (Women’s publication in Detroit) (got done about 20 minutes ago) Tonight I have the Detroit FreePress, so look out for that! ….  I’m leaving Monday evening for NYC and returning next Sunday! ..  On Tueday morning I’ll be taping for The VIEW! YES! I’ll be on with Barbara Walters, Joy Behar, Whoopi Goldberg, Elisabeth Hasselbeck and Sherri Sheppard! … It’s going to be a 6-7 minute interview and it will air Friday, Sept 28th! …  I’ll be doing some big ad sales in NYC while I’m there- and I’m sponsoring the Ypulse Tween Mashup!  … “

With no guidance, no godfathers/ godmothers in the family with business knowledge , with no academic degree and from a relatively average family backgroud, this little girl had come a long way. But she is strong minded to reject a cool 1.5 million offer for her company. That proves the power which drives Ashley.

This is the amazing power of the internet. Internet Entrepreneurs come  from all walks of life and rise to a level and scale never ever imagined . It is sheer hard smart work and correct timing that matters most.

Good Luck young lady.

Courtesy :  Fast Company

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A smart idea , a new concept , a different approach or a well packaged offering catches the attention of people and  creates a revolution  to bring money and/or fame to the people who ignited the spark (Its always the early bird which catches most worms but the worms need to be late) . The virtual world is no exception to this wave effect. The irony of the internet is that though it is extremely large with  gazzilion websites and blogs , we can reach the people across international barriers within minutes.

In this series I  intend to highlight some of the wave creators of the virtual world. Be it  a simple or complex , a smart or dumb idea,  if it made the headlines it should  be highlighted. Who knows this spark can ignite many other minds that are longing to glow.

One such idea is the “Million Dollar Homepage” from Alex Tew. The simple but brilliant idea to create a site with million pixels and sell each pixel for $1 in blocks of 100 pixels sent waves on the net. In a short time all the slots were sold and replaced with the logo of the company/ person who purchased it. Alex not only earned  million dollars but also earned good name and fame. It has been 2 years now since this idea originated and there are a hundred variations of it on the net. But Alex is the pioneer. 

Why didn’t I get such an idea ? 

Drop a note on other ideas which you think are ground breakers?

Popularity: 13% [?]