The Why and How of this website stem from the need to work from home and a desire to contribute to my families fiancial security.

But let me jump back a bit from the Why and How and tell you a little about myself.

Hi there! My names Michele and I'm married to a British serviceman (Faz). In the past I had always been successful fitting my career; first in Retail management then in Estate Agency around my husbands military role and many, many postings.

Then we decided to have a child... I was in the midst of a very successful period as a busy property valuer and the plan was to return to work soon after Josh (my son) was weaned.

Well that was the plan... but the reality proved to be rather different.

The sharp suited and booted business woman who to all intense and purposes planned to schedule her son into her busy diary had what I can only describe as an emotional epiphany.

My life turned on its head and Josh became my number 1 priority.

Initially I did return to work but the pressure of trying to meet my business commitments whilst adhering to a day nursery time schedule, arrange all my usual evening appointments for the weekend and generally keep my mind on my job and not the huge lump of anxiety that lodged in my throat the moment I dropped Josh at daycare each morning proved to be just too much.

After only one month I knew things had to change. So after much soul searching and agonizing indecision (It's difficult to give up something your good at and contributes in a big way to your identity) I handed in my notice at work and prepared myself for life’s next challenge.

At first it was fantastic being on hand to meet my 8 month old sons every need but eventually the financial burden of loosing a significant income began to put a dent in the equilibrium at home. There's only so much downsizing and financial reorganizing one can do. The harsh reality was I needed to supplement our income.

Going out to work again even on a part time basis just wasn't practical. Leaving my son to the care of others and watch my earnings be gobbled up by child care costs simply wasn't an option. So I started to look for alternatives.

In the first place I answered a few of those work from home ads you see posted in various places and fell foul of a rather disappointing Multi Level Marketing program. Then I tried selling various products via party plan which was a great social outlet but really didn't provide the level of earnings I hoped for.

In 2006 I turned my attention to the internet and had a couple of attempts at launching ecommerce websites. I had no technical knowledge and absolutely no understanding of HTML or the various means of designing and hosting websites. So as you can imagine I blundered around in the dark for many, many months.

Then my husband’s career brought us to Cyprus. A country I know well as my parents have lived here since the 1980's. This change in location and pace of life provided a spark of inspiration.

I wanted to share my inside knowledge of the island with others and hopefully find some income generating avenues along the way.

So, I had the idea but how to execute it? I'd dipped my toe into the world of websites in the past and quite frankly come out considerably more confused and extremely disillusioned.

My husband suggested I research the web for sites with a similar theme to see how they did it.

This proved to be a great bit of advice. During a surfing session I fell upon a website about Villas in Tuscany. It was very informative, great to look at and an entertaining read. In fact the perfect blue print for what I wanted to create.

As I navigated the site I began to notice references to SBI and when I checked out the authors about us section I felt finally I might have hit upon the answer to my dilemma of How to build a website when you actually have No IDEA of How to build a website!

Fiona & Jim Macardle (the owners of the Tuscany Villa site) walked me through how they set about creating the extremely successful site. These were people who had both quit hectic and successful careers in UK and moved to Tuscany to enjoy and create a better life for their kids. A bit of an upside down but mirror image of the circumstances I found myself in.

But hang on; there was still that problem of having no clue how to succeed on the web. I decided to put my skepticism on the back boiler and read some of the explanatory material Fiona & Jim directed me to about SBI. Incidentally those three little letters stand for Site Build It .

First of all I had a look at the Site Build It homepage which introduced me to an overview and How it works. This page had a great video tour and the accompanying text ran through all the elements of the SBI system. If people are short of time when they first come across SBI this is the page to visit.

Then because I'm the sort of person who wants more than one opinion on a topic I had a look at some other case studies and SBI successes

The prevailing messages I came away with from all of this were

1. If you come to the table with the will and determination to succeed SBI provide you with the means to build an info-rich site that Search engines will love and subsequently deliver targeted traffic.

2. SBI isn't for people who are looking for illusive get-rich-quick ventures. Neither is it in the market of promoting throwing up a website overnight and expecting instant success.(Sound familiar?!)

3. An extremely reasonable yearly fee would not only provide me with excellent web hosting but step-by step on going training and support to build and maintain a successful site. This was perhaps the biggest plus for me as I already knew that a web based business was the answer to my work from home dilemma. The How was what had eluded me thus far.

4. The next and really valuable message I received was SBI are prepared and ready to put their money where their mouth is. Even though they’d already provided me with heaps of Case studies and testimonials and I'd checked out each and everyone of the corresponding websites that had been built by the people featured in the case studies, SBI were willing to take things one step further. This is their no questions asked, no quibble risk free guarantee

Purchase it now and...

•Try it. Simply follow the Video Action Guide.
•Register your domain.
•Build your site.
•Watch traffic build from Google, Yahoo!, etc.
•Enjoy your growing, profits.
•If you decide (at any time) it's not for you, simply tell us. It does not matter why. We'll refund you right away.

I have to be honest with you this was the straw that broke the back for me. I seemed to have little to lose and everything to gain and that’s coming from someone who had already been bitten in the past.

So where am I now?

I'm still living in Cyprus with my husband and son (now 4). We enjoy a rich lifestyle. Eating out when we want to and enjoying the various areas of our island each weekend. We've been able to purchase the various gadgets and gizmos all growing children crave and have just come back from a fantastic holiday in the States. (I promised Joshua a week in Orlando for being such a good boy when Mum needed to work on the computer when he was home from school).

In reality this site is still fairly young and has oodles of room for expansion. But, I already have an integrated hotel booking engine that generates income every time someone clicks through and books.

I've included editorial pages for excellent local offline businesses that generate income on a referral basis and as yet I haven't even touched on Google Ads revenue.

However probably the most significant income generator is that I'm now a successful independant wedding consultant helping the many couples that choose to marry in Cyprus plan their weddings. This twist in the tale came about from the many enquiries I get from brides asking for advice about getting married on our island.

Life is good!

If you can relate to any of the above maybe you would like to know more about MY SBI JOURNEY & HOW I BUILT MY SITE.

Or why not simply have a good dig through the SBI promotional material like I did.

With that Risk free Guarantee there really is little to lose and all to gain...

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