Income School Project 24 Course Review | Is It Worth The Money?
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Originally Posted On: https://keywordcare.com/project-24-review/
Website building and affiliate marketing can be very viable and appealing sources of income. I’m sure you’ve read blog post after blog post of online content creators, convincing you to take their course on how to become an expert at monetizing your content. They make it sound like they have the answers to all of your problems.
Soon you’ll be making thousands of dollars and quitting your day job before you know it, all thanks to their colorful PDF documents. But did these people just have a random stroke of luck? Have they actually tried their method more than once? Why would you model a potential business after someone who hasn’t done further research?
I’m here to introduce you to a company and a program that I HAVE tested. Income School and their Project 24. I have personally met the owners (Ricky & Jim) and had the great privilege of learning directly from them in my own home, where I received two full days of 1 to 1 personal coaching from them.
A privilege not many get from these world-leading niche website affiliate marketers.
In this article, I’ll share with you my personal experience meeting with Ricky and Jim. We’ll also talk about the passive income I’ve made through using their tried and true methods, as well as how you can get started in building a profitable niche/authority website.
Let’s get started!
Personal Relationship With Income School
Before we discuss Project 24, I thought I’d share with you how I met Ricky and Jim and why I endorse them as much as I do. A little over a year ago, Income School had a contest on their YouTube channel. They would travel to whoever won and help them create and optimize their niche site for monetization. It was fairly simple to enter, all you had to do was comment on one of their videos. So I did it. I commented and low and behold, I won!
Ricky and Jim packed their bags and flew all the way from the US to the UK to meet with me. We sat down over the course of two days and discussed my already existing site. Together we took a look at my niche, what content I had already created and how it was performing.
After analyzing my current work, it was clear that with some tweaks, my site had the potential to increase exponentially in traffic which would then increase in monetization. I saw fairly immediate results and even just a year later, I’m earning much more online than I was prior to meeting Ricky and Jim. Overall, I’d say it was a very eye-opening experience and one I won’t soon forget.
Just one of my sites alone has seen traffic increase by over 200% and is now very close to earning me a full-time income. Just from that one site!
Why am I telling you this? Because I know how genuine Ricky and Jim are. I know first hand that Project 24 works. Perhaps most importantly, I’m the only reviewer who has had this personal experience. While I could sit back and keep all of this information to myself, I have chosen to share it with all of you. It was a stroke of luck that I won that contest and now I want to help point all of you in the right direction to creating a profitable niche site of your own. That’s what a creative community is all about. My experience with Income School and Project 24, was lifechanging and it could be the same for you!
Ricky and Jim arriving at my home
What Is Income School?
Ricky Kesler and Jim Harmer founded Income School in 2013. To be clear, they purchased the domain in 2013 but they didn’t see success until a few years later. Ricky and Jim have been friends since high school and have a long-standing friendship and business partnership.
The two had built several niche websites up to success and thought they should create a platform sharing their method. They started off with a podcast that didn’t take off quite as they’d hoped, but persistence is key. Their successful websites, some of which are listed below have been used to showcase their system and methods. Some of which they sold for large sums of money and some they continue to grow and use as case studies.
ImprovePhotography – Sold 2019 for an undisclosed sum. Reported to be a 7 Figure sum!
Knifeup.com – Sold in the region of $250,000+
CamperReport.com – Earns $8,000+ per month
Emborapets – Gets over 100,000 page views a month after only 12 Months
If you’re unsure of their credentials to make and run an affiliate marketing course then check out the sites above.
Instead of giving up and selling their domain, they decided to exhaust all of their options. That’s where Youtube comes into the picture.
They hadn’t yet tried marketing their program via Youtube. It started off a bit haphazard just posting here and there but pretty soon after, they had amassed a fairly large audience, hungry for SEO and marketing tips. Before they knew it, Income School was a 7 figure per year business.
As previously stated, persistence is key!
Did you know in Hollywood they use a phrase “overnight success is 10 years in the making”? That’s because when you see a big star suddenly appear on screen, they’ve probably played much smaller roles before. You just never knew their name before. Keep in mind persistence is key and overnight success is 10 years in the making when starting your business.
Back to Income School and Project 24. This is a resource designed to give you a step by step guide for creating a niche and authority site. What is an authority site? When you google a topic, you’ll be given a little snippet or blurb at the top of your search page. That brief summary of your search comes from an authority site. Wouldn’t you like to have your content ranked so high that it is considered an authority site by Google?
Ricky and Jim promise to teach you how to make money online so that you can support your family. If you want to earn a passive income via blogging or niche sites, I couldn’t recommend Income School and Project 24 more highly. Essentially, this program will take you step-by-step through the process of creating either a niche or an authority website. After completing the course, in 24 months, you’ll have a full-time online business.
That’s actually how Project 24 got its name. the goal of Project 24 is for you to be able to replace your current income with passive income within 24 months.
It really is possible to have a full-time income from home within 24 months. No gimmicks, no tricks just solid proven SEO methods that work. I am living proof that anyone with little to no experience can do this. I had no computer or internet skills, I could barely use the TV remote.
A lot of other programs will tell you it’s possible within the first month. While it is possible to see some revenue in the first month, it’s much more realistic to look at a program with longevity and realistic timelines. Remember, overnight success is ten years in the making! There are no shortcuts and it will be entirely worth it in the long run.
Me and Ricky having a chat about everything affiliate!
My Stats And Results
I still can’t to this day believe that in the month of March 2019 I got a knock on the door. On opening it I was greeted by a very tired looking Ricky and Jim after they’d traveled from the USA to my home town in the UK to share their knowledge and work on one of my niche websites.
I’m sure you’ve just watched the video about it, so I won’t go into too much detail. But I can tell you several months later the site www.fishkeepingforever.com has gone from strength to strength.
I haven’t seen a huge spike in traffic nor any overnight success stories, but I have seen a strong growth which is around 1500 organic page views a month consistently since their visit.
I only had one month where I saw a small decline and this was due to me changing hosting, server and SEO plugin.
But after a couple of weeks, the traffic growth was back and continues to grow.
Revenue has been a carefully planned strategy, again thanks to their advice. Our plan was to target traffic before monetizing and chasing ‘Buyer intent Keywords’.
Like the famous quote says ‘Build it and they will come’ Well, it’s the same for commissions and earnings.
Once the traffic started to rise above 5000 page views a month I added Ezoic Ads. We had a few issues with setting this up and using their DNS servers (which I don’t recommend), but once it was set up correctly, I started to see some nice earnings from ads. If your site is new, I would say just start with Google Ads, then as your traffic grows, switch to Ezoic. You’ll need 5000 page views a month. Once you hit that number contact them. Here’s my Ezoic affiliate link, I would be grateful if you use it. Thanks.
The next stage of our monetizing strategy was to increase traffic before adding ‘Buyer Intent Keywords’ Or ‘Money Keywords’ as some people like to call them.
These are keywords like, Best, Top, Review, Sale, Cheapest… and so on.
These are harder to rank for keywords but will bring you more sales and affiliate clicks which equals more in commissions.
This screenshot is only organic traffic. We also have around 7000 views a month from social. Total 20,000+ monthly
Once we had hit 15,000 page views a month we started to add these types of articles. We instantly saw our revenue increase significantly. All as planned!
As your domain age and authority grows and your traffic increases you can start to focus on revenue as we are doing now. Going after those ‘Buyer intent keywords’.
As you can see from the screenshot above, traffic still increases week on week and so too does our revenue.
So, what’s the plan going forward… Continue with the hit list of articles Income school and Project 24 came up with and increase traffic and add more buyer intent articles and keywords.
If you follow the Project 24 Modules step-by-step, there is no reason why you can’t do the same.
How Project 24 Works
Project 24 is broken up into 12 modules to make the information easy to digest. Master one before moving onto the next. Modules include things like a 60 step guide, search analysis, email marketing, hiring writers and much more. I’ll briefly breakdown each module below.
It’s also important to note that Ricky and Jim update their content constantly to make sure everything is up to date. They also have an hour-long seminar video, along with a wealth of knowledge on their YouTube channel. Let’s breakdown each of the modules to give you a better idea of the course.
Module 1
The first module in Project 24 breaks down 60 steps to creating a successful website. This is the groundwork for everything else you’ll be doing and arguably the most important step. Essentially it’ll breakdown what makes a website successful in things like selecting a good niche, keyword research, generating revenue through your website, and even setting up a WordPress site. WordPress can be a bit tricky but they break it down in a very user-friendly fashion, so no need to be intimidated. This course alone is worth its weight in gold. Ricky and Jim went through the process with me in person to see where I could fix my site and it truly made a world of a difference.
Module 2
Module 2 focuses on search analysis. Can an audience find your content if they search for it? This step breaks down your niche and helps you find the best keywords and topics to focus on to make sure your content is unique. It also ensures that you won’t run out of topics to write about in the future. This part of the course was especially helpful to me. I had content on my site already but I was just writing the same guides over and over. Once Ricky and Jim helped me come up with new subject matter to expand upon in my niche, I saw a definite increase in traffic.
Module 3
Module 3 focuses on choosing a profitable niche. Rick and Jim know a thing or two about selecting a profitable niche. They’ve created a list of over 350 niches for you to sift through. It’s important to take a good look at what you want your niche to be. Will it actually have the potential to be monetized? Is it too specific? It would really be a shame to invest heavily in a niche website only to find out that your niche is not profitable. Taking the time to really investigate if a specific niche is worth your time will be worth it in the long run. This module has a 50-minute video explaining how to select a solid niche.
Project 24 modules are easy to follow and there’s lots of other helpful information within the course
Module 4
SEO or search engine optimization. This essentially makes sure your content is visible in search results. Many people find SEO intimidating. Although it is a lot of information, it’s really not that difficult. In this module, the video breaks down methods to increase your organic search engine results and ideas to increase traffic to your site.
Many SEO optimization courses teach what are called ‘black-hat’ tricks. These are against the rules and you can be penalized by Google. Ricky and Jim are not interested in taking shortcuts, so you don’t have to worry about any of their tactics being against the rules. They focus only on white-hat tricks. Their course also focuses on creating a site that will work with any Google algorithm changes.
Instagram changes their algorithm all the time and you’ll hear people complaining about a decrease in traffic. You’ll avoid a decrease in traffic on your site should Google change their algorithm. This ensures you have a steady stream of income.
Module 5
This module focuses on web traffic. You can have the best content centered on your niche, but if you don’t have an audience, then what’s the point? Throughout this module, Ricky and Jim break down the best way to drive traffic to your site through social media. Not only do they breakdown which social media platforms are actually worth your time, but they’ll discuss which ones are most time-efficient. Time is money. Time efficiency is key.
This course teaches you how to focus on social media strategies that take up the least amount of your valuable time so you can spend your time doing more important things. It’ll also ensure you have the best chance possible to receive a return on your investment.
Module 6
Email marketing. This module will discuss whether your site may or may not need to have an email marketing plan. For some niche sites and blogs, a subscriber list is of the utmost importance. If your website is more of an authority site, then this might not serve you very much. This course is valuable because it breaks down how to use email marketing in a way that will encourage audience engagement. Increasing genuine audience engagement can turn your audience into potential buyers. It’ll also help you decide if email marketing will be beneficial for your site or not.
Module 7
This module breaks down common myths surrounding website building. A lot of people will tell you to focus on something called the keyword golden ratio or KGR for short. Some people find this to be a very valuable tool, others would tell you not to waste your time. Jim and Ricky explain it in depth. They’ll also discuss the pros and cons to ensure you can make an educated decision when it comes to deciding if you want to utilize KGR in your site.
Module 8
Quality content is of the utmost importance if you want to have a successful niche or authority site. Quality content also takes time to write. This all goes back to ‘time is money’. Ricky and Jim discuss the importance of hiring quality writers who can step in when you don’t have the time to write your own content. This module will break down how to find the right writers as well as how to communicate with your writers about exactly the type of content you’re seeking. It also breaks down teaching your writers how to post their content on your WordPress site.
Module 9
Professional photography is an area that’s often overlooked when training people on how to build a quality niche or authority site. Audiences are very visual, which makes photography a very important element of your site. This module teaches you how to take quality photographs that your audience will enjoy. It includes 22 lessons on topics ranging from selecting the correct aperture to finding the best lighting landscapes.
Module 10
This module dives into website reviews. Ricky and Jim take the time to review sites that have been developed by Project 24 students. You can learn an awful lot by seeing critiques of other people’s work.
Module 11
As previously stated, quality content is key. Module 11 introduces a post structure for your content that will ultimately increase your speed as a writer. It’ll also delve into selecting the right topic to write about.
Module 12
Last but certainly not least, this module focuses on advertisement monetization. Many people are drawn to creating websites with the goal of monetization. It takes a while to build a quality website that ultimately will be successful with monetization. Readers are smart. They’ll be able to tell if you’re writing to create quality and engaging content or if you’re writing just to make a buck. This course breaks down how to use advertisements for immediate monetization so you can focus on creating quality content.
What’s The Cost Of Project 24?
The cost for membership to Project 24 is currently listed at $449 for the first year, then $199 per year after that. since the course is always being updated and add-ons are ongoing.
Compared to some other courses, which I have reviewed in detail but not tried (so I can’t comment), it does seem very good value. Some other courses are listed at $899, $1500 and the highest we found was $2400.
So as a price comparison we believe $449 is well placed in the market place.
If I had to pick one reason why I would recommend purchasing Project 24 – it is the time-saving element of the course. Yes, you could search Google and Youtube and find a lot of this information for FREE.
But it would take you a lifetime to learn!
For $449 you get everything you need in a simple step-by-step guide with realistic time scales to speed up the success of your niche website.
This course, in my opinion, will save you years of testing and guessing. I know that after my 1 to 1 coaching with them and their course, I’m about 12 months ahead of where I would have been if I had done it all alone.
Testimonials
It’s not only my own success that is proof that Project 24 works. I also have other friends like Paul who is featured on their website as a success story. He has not only created a great niche website using their course but he has also used their Youtube Modules to help start and build a strong Youtube channel which is growing week on week. He now has nearly 10,000 subscribers!
Click here to visit his channel.
Who Is Project 24 For?
Project 24 is truly for everyone. Ricky and Jim say that beginners, people who have dabbled and have yet to see success, as well as experienced internet marketers, can all learn something from their course. Whether you’re just starting out and need to set up a WordPress site or, if you’re a seasoned veteran looking to make some smart tweaks to increase your revenue, you’re sure to find value in this course.
One of my biggest questions was… Is the course suitable for someone who already has a website and already makes money online? Yes, the content within the course also offers information perfect for intermediates who would like to expand on their success. Maybe you want to start ranking for single, high-volume keywords, rather than long-tail keywords.
Or maybe you’d like to expand into Youtube to gain a second income revenue. ‘Income School’ are experts in Youtube content and Video SEO.
Project 24 not only gives you exclusive content, but it also gives you a community to rely on. It’s important to have people who will support you in your endeavors. The online forum is a great place to ask for advice or even just to chat. Ricky and Jim are online very often as well and are more than happy to help with any issues you might be experiencing. They’ll also breakdown topics further if you’re having trouble understanding something.
Additional Project 24 Features
Now that we’ve broken down the course a little let’s move onto some of the other features of Project 24. In this section we’ll cover:
- The Forum – Discord
- Youtube
- Constantly Updated Content
- The Acabado Theme
The Forum – Discord
Personally, I’m a big fan of the Project 24 Forum. It’s worth its weight in gold. Not only do you receive fantastic training through the modules, but you also gain a wonderfully supportive community. Let’s say you have a question about something you’re writing. Does it make sense? How does the layout look? Is the content thought-provoking and captivating? Hop onto Discord and consult your community in the forum. People are more than happy to provide feedback and suggestions. Remember that a community requires give and take. If you want valuable feedback, then be prepared to give feedback to others as well. You’ll learn a lot from providing constructive critiques to your community.
Not only are Project 24 members always active on the forum, but Ricky and Jim are constantly online as well. They love answering questions and strive to provide you with encouragement along the way.
YouTube
YouTube is predicted to be the future of search queries on Google. Video format will grow and take over in the next few years. Ricky and Jim were very transparent in the fact that Income School didn’t take off until they utilized YouTube. Because they’re firm believers in the platform, Ricky and Jim include many YoutTube strategies in the Project 24 course. They answer all of your questions from SEO guides to what makes content informative and engaging.
You’ll receive tips and tricks for your video content and gain access to exclusive Project 24 videos. Ricky and Jim are very giving with their knowledge. They love sharing what works for them and how you can implement their methods. Their YouTube channel offers a wealth of information for free to non-members. As a member, you’ll gain access to even more exclusive content.
Constantly Updated Content
Most online guides consist of a PDF booklet and that’s about it. These become dated rather quickly when algorithms and social media platforms change. It’s important to note that Ricky and Jim constantly update their content. This means you’ll always have the latest info regarding internet trends and SEO practices.
For instance, Income School received a ton of questions regarding Pinterest. Pinterest is a great social media platform for promoting your blog posts and products. Not only does the platform have great analytics but the site receives tons of traffic. It’s quite simple to market yourself and your brand if you know the right tips and tricks. Ricky and Jim listened to the questions and recently released a new module centered on Pinterest and optimizing your account. What a wonderful example of listening to your customers.
Project 24 gives access to all of their personal apps before releasing them to the public. They have a plugin in the works currently for internal linking within your content. Internal linking is incredibly important when it comes to audience retention. The plugin will be made available to Project 24 members before anyone else, which is very exciting.
Currently, we use LINKWHISPER to interlink all our articles. But I’m sure once Income School releases their plugin we’ll be trying it out!
Acabado Theme
Not everyone realizes just how important website response time is when it comes to website traffic. Google considers response time as one of the main factors in ranking your site on Search Engine Result Pages (SERP). Most WordPress themes and plugins are pretty bulky files. They might look appealing, but they aren’t always designed for function. This makes it difficult to optimize your site’s speed. Ricky and Jim acknowledged that this is a problem. They set out to create a solution. After a lot of researching and testing on their own websites, the Acabado theme was born and was first offered to Project 24 members.
Selecting a theme is of the utmost importance for your website. It’s essentially the entire foundation for all of your content. Your readers will judge your content and brand largely on the overall attractiveness of your site. This effects how your site is perceived and will ultimately help or hinder your business. So when looking for a theme, consider the needs of your business. Are you more of an affiliate site? Are you an authority site? Do you need the capabilities to sell products? Acabado has the capability to support all of these things.
Not only is Acabado multi-functional, but it’s also designed to give incredible website speed. With its customizable and attractive design, you’re sure to impress your audience. Ricky and Jim were smart to consider the mobile site design first since most traffic comes through mobile devices. We’ll go more into depth about that in just a bit. We’ll also take a look at their built-in SEO and easy setup process.
Why is it called Acabado? It’s Portuguese for “finished.” We wanted to focus on the speed and clean design which makes it easy to do a site redesign in under 3 minutes with Acabado. The REAL reason, though, is that it’s just so fun to say. It’s pronounced “Ah-cah-bah-doe.”
See how clean and fast the Acabado Theme is on www.outdoortroop.com
Enhanced Speed
Google scores your website speed from 1 to 100. It’s nearly unheard of to have a 100% score on their Page Speed test. On average, most WordPress sites have a score of 50% or less. The Acabado theme was tweaked until it regularly tested at 100%, which is just incredible. Note that your score will not be affected by the number of images you feature on your site. The theme promises quick response time on both desktops and mobile devices.
SEO
Adding plugins to your site oftentimes slows things down. With such high importance placed on SEO, many sites activate second party SEO plugins. These plugins analyze your content and offer a sort of checklist to ensure your content is optimized. While those are great tools to have, is it worth negatively impacting your Google speed test? With the Acabado theme, you can have SEO optimized content while also maintaining the integrity of your website speed. The theme has built-SEO capabilities to ensure your content is consistently optimized.
Overall Appearance
Many WordPress themes require hours of customization to enhance the appearance of your site before it can be launched to the public. Acabado was designed to save time keeping appearance in mind and requires no customization. However, if you’d like to make adjustments to the theme, you most certainly can. This theme is especially ideal for those with little coding or website design experience. Just set it up and go.
Decreased Bounce Rate
We’ve all been there, you’re reading an intriguing article on a site and suddenly your screen is covered by a popup asking you to subscribe. Or perhaps its an offer for some sort of class or informational guide. The interruption takes you right out of what you were initially reading. This is not the intention of the popup. The desired intention is to retain a reader’s attention and prevent bounce.
What is bounce? Bounce is when a reader leaves your site. As a website owner, you want visitors to stay on your site for as long as possible. This is why creating internal links is so important. Give them more to read!
Acabado works to prevent bounce by doing away with big annoying popups. Instead, Acabado utilizes minimal messages that won’t interrupt the reader’s experience. There’s nothing an audience hates more than feeling something is being pushed on them. Keeping messages minimal will encourage your audience to stick around and read more content. This can also lead to an increase in your income and who doesn’t want that!
Mobile Optimization
Did you know that on average, more than half of your website traffic comes from mobile devices? This makes having an optimized mobile display absolutely necessary. Ricky and Jim took note of this fact and worked to design the mobile layout before creating the desktop display. Acabado is one of the few, if not the only theme to place such a high emphasis on mobile optimization. Your overall mobile site appearance and efficiency won’t be compromised with the Acabado theme. In all likelihood, your mobile website might look even better than your desktop design.
We already discussed the new Pinterest module developed by Ricky and Jim. Well, they didn’t stop there, they also made it possible for you to add Pinterest images to your site. This is great for increasing your organic traffic. Now, what do I mean by Pinterest images? Images that your audience can “pin” to their Pinterest account. Pinterest is essentially a giant bookmarking site or library of links and images from all over the internet. Users sort these links like recipes and travel guides into boards. Having a pin button with all of your images allows your readers to save/pin your images to their Pinterest boards. This is free, organic marketing for you and your content.
Acabado Preview & Purchasing
If you’d like to see this theme in action, Ricky and Jim have implemented it on a few of their own niche sites. Check out Camper Report and Outdoor Troop to see the functionality and customization of this theme.
When it comes to purchasing Acabado, Ricky and Jim offer two different buying options. The first option is a yearly recurring payment of $50. The second option is a 100-year license which is a one-time payment of $99. I’d definitely suggest the 100-year license as it is the biggest bang for your buck. Project 24 members will also receive added incentives and discounts for utilizing the Acabado theme.
See their incredibly fast and clean theme here!
Conclusion: Should You Buy ‘Project 24’ Course?
Income School and Project 24 have made a world of a difference to me and my income. I’m so thankful to have won the contest last year and to have had the opportunity to meet Ricky and Jim in person. I truly hope my personal account and review of the program is beneficial to you and the creation of your business.
Keep in mind that overnight success is ten years in the making. Ricky and Jim have designed a course that will take 24 months but those 24 months will be well worth it in the long run when you have replaced your desk job with a full-time business passive income.