I’m Chris Hooley, originally from Tewksbury Mass, a small swampy suburb 15-20 minutes outside of Boston. I’m 33 and I’ve been making money online for probably about a decade or so. I don’t even remember when I started, because it’s all I remember since.
Do you have any experience with affiliate marketing? If so, to what extent?
That’s all I do these days. Looking to branch out and build some brick and mortar businesses eventually but for now, I’m pretty much just an affiliate.
What accomplishments so far are you the most proud of?
As far as making money online goes? Probably the 5 billion dollars in student loans I generated. But I’m also pretty stoked to have help countless guys grow their weeners and find a date in their area. In my personal life, I’m most proud of being a single dad who takes good care of his kiddo.
How did you become successful? Why did you choose this career? When did you first realize the full potential in the Internet? When did you first “hit the big time?”
This career fell in my lap really. When I was a 420 friendly dumb teenager I had pipe dreams of being the next Dr. Dre (only with slightly less melanin) so I “launched” my “studio” and called it Mission Control Productions. I use quotes because I bought some crappy gear and started making beats and trying to get people to rap over them. I made LITERALLY HUNDREDS. I was ballin. And it only cost me a few thousand to start up. Realizing, in all my intelligence, that I could scale this cash cow, I taught myself how to build websites with flash so I could make millions online somehow by owning a crappy “studio” in Phoenix. Then I started looking into getting traffic to my site, and I stumbled on to SEO by mistake. I was getting my site listed in various directories and such, and my site started ranking for all kinds of stuff. So I launched another site and pounded links to it and eventually owned the #1 spot on Google for the word “crack”. I had no idea how to monetize it, but I learned about SEO quick, and became pretty good at it. And I could show my friends and look awesome. I also started ranking my friends for various stupid terms just for fun. In fact I’m pretty sure I still rank #1 for Captain Thundercock… well at least until you publish this, you’ll have the honor I’m sure. Unless maybe you hyperlink that text to my blog in which case I should still hold that spot and you’ll probably sit pretty at #2.
Anyways, I started taking clients, and eventually took a corporate gig where I crushed in student loans, but legislature a few years ago combined with our bank system almost collapsing pushed me out of my cushy corporate gig and out on my own again. I took a few clients, realized it wasn’t going to make me happy, and dove balls deep into affiliate marketing about a year and a half ago.
Managing a multimillion dollar budget in a competitive vertical groomed me well for buying traffic and making money from it. I also made a lot of friends along the way who’ve helped me a ton.
I still haven’t realized the full potential of the internet. By some looser standards I could probably be considering a super affiliate, but I see the big boys and I know I have a long way to go before I can call myself that. I’ve had campaigns that hit hard in spurts, but have yet to sustain and pillage like some of you ballers out there.
What do you think it takes to be successful?
Balls and brains. For the ladies; guts and brains. And sometimes boobies.
What have been your biggest failures and frustrations?
A far as failures; I’ve fallen flat on my face so many times with so many campaigns. Lost insane amounts of money in spurts trying to figure this all out, and I still do sometimes. But as long as I keep minimizing losses and maximizing gains and getting wiser and smarter at how I approach all this affiliate bizz I imagine it will be less of a frustration as I get bigger and better.
My biggest frustration so far in affiliate marketing is when I launched my first killer campaign. Was absolutely killing it, but didn’t have my traffic sources dialed in yet. And I started seeing my ads and LP EVERYWHERE. I would try to buy media in those same places and some people who fully jacked my page and ads had those sources locked up in exclusive deals and I had to watch bigger affiliates pillage my campaign and make 10x more than I could myself. I still wanna rip a couple people’s faces off for that.
What is the single toughest problem you've had to face, and how did you get through it?
Scaling, and I am still getting through it. I have a lot to learn.
Is there anything that you don’t like to do, that you just hate working on?
Yeah, work.
What is the future of marketing?
If I knew, I probably wouldn’t be publishing it now, especially on somebody else’s site… I would probably be rapping it, then writing a “how to” once everybody else figured it out too. Then I would probably make an info product out of it and rock clickbank.
What have you been up to recently? What projects are you working on?
Some of my newer projects are not as focused on online marketing, but more the product itself. I intend on using my online marketing experience to push the projects, but I want to have an actual “thing” I can easily explain to people and be proud of. I mean I like money but I don’t exactly get a lot of personal satisfaction from helping broke moms learn how to make monies online.
I have some pretty cool ideas. One is a nonprofit, another, a chain of brick and mortar businesses in the health industry.
What problems have you had with those new projects?
Diverting time from Halo and affiliate marketing to actually flip the switch and just do it. Once I get rolling I don’t stop, but I don’t wanna roll until I really have this affiliate stuff down. I’m pretty good for a newbie affiliate but I am still only a little over a year in the game.
Do you think anything particular in your past prepared you for this industry? Your education? Jobs you’ve held before?
Definitely the corporate gig.
What are your greatest strengths?
I’ve had a lot of success in finding the right people and empowering them to become rockstars in their own right. They in turn help me in so many ways. I’m really proud to have made a positive impact on my friends and family by helping get them into or out of 9 to 5 jobs and helping them reach the next level.
What are your greatest weaknesses?
Impatience, and investing too much time into projects that end up not being as brilliant as I thought when I started… and sniping in Halo. I have no idea how those kids keep picking me off so fast but it pisses me off.
What motivates you?
Money, happiness, glory, friendship, laughter, helping others, money, women, Xbox 360 achievements, and money.
What is the best advice you’ve been given and try to apply to your life?
Just do it. There’s no such thing as failure, just lessons you learn on your way to success. My dad is awesome.
Who has impacted you most in your career, and how?
Probably my dad, for showing me an example of how to succeed in life and not accepting failure.
What kinds of people do you have difficulties working with? Any good stories?
I could write a novel about the people who are more focused on the process than just getting the job done, or the people who are always looking for the silver bullet, or people who just plain and simple don’t get it. I tend to get along with anybody with a sense of humor, but working with dumb people is pretty frikkin hard.
What are some of your long-term goals? How much is enough? If money was no object, what would you be doing?
I wanna raise a happy, well adjusted kid. And I wanna find a good girl, marry her, spoil her, take her around the world, and grow old with her, laughing the whole way through. If money was no object I wouldn’t be doing much else different except maybe donating to causes I believe in and helping even more people.
Where do you want to be ten years from now?
Right here in AZ with my family and friends. I love it here.
How do you like to spend your free time? What doe work-life balance mean to you?
I waste too much time on video games but besides that I travel, ride quads, obsess about football, work out too much, play with my kid, and do all kinds of typical guy stuff. I refuse to let my work be my main source of my sense of self anymore. It burned me out and I was unhappy. I respect those hustlers who never stop, but I will always hold on to having my own life outside of work. That’s part of the reason I’m in business for myself, so I don’t have somebody telling me where I gotta be and when.
If you could go back to being 18, what different career choices would you make?
I would have taken all those skills I put into clients and my corporate gig and done it all for myself. I made other people richer than I’ve ever made myself, and still to this day that pisses me off and motivates me.
What is your greatest achievement outside of work? What are some of your unfulfilled dreams?
Being a single daddy, and finding her a suitable step mom so she can have a more stable and traditional home. Being a single dad is hard, and working out of your home can be lonely sometimes (can I get a wickedfire SO GAY rainbow on that part please?) so I just want to get that part of my life settled so I can get on with becoming an old dude with too much money and a cool companion.
Do you have a Twitter account or Facebook “Like” page?
Yeah you can follow me on twitter at www.twitter.com/ChrisHooley.
If you find me on facebook, so be it. You gotta be my friend tho 
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