Ok, so that’s a provocative title for someone running an internet marketing support center so what’s it all about. Well, quite frankly I’m sick of the over-hyped sales pitches that many affiliate products contain. Many are great, even fantastic products, but, they make ridiculous promises about potential earnings and the speed at which things can happen. The average guy is not going to make much money in their first 6 months online and things aren’t going to happen that fast.
In this regard the whole internet marketing industry is shooting itself in the foot. The potential to make a “I never dreamt it was possible” living online is still enormous, but, as I repeat with monotonous regularity in this blog, you need to get a thorough understanding of the basics, draw up a plan and be ruthless in your determination and application of that plan. You need to do the work and be confident that in approximately 6 to 12 months time all that hard work will start to bear fruit.
So what is the best way to make sure that 6 to 12 months isn’t wasted? Without doubt my first choice is Wealthy Affiliate University. These guys really know what they’re doing and offer a highly structured 8 week course to build a solid foundation. You even get free web hosting, templates, keyword research and many other tools which means there is no need to outlay a lot of cash. It only costs $29.99 per month and must be the best value on the net. You also get access to a lot of very successful internet marketers with big reputations that are only to happy to help you out - all you have to do is ask.
I also recommend Profit Lance which help me understand the many monetization models out there and pick the ones that were most suitable for me. Profit Lance costs a mere $77.00 and is a great bargain.
If you’ve read any of my previous posts you’ll know I’m an advocate of three programs that will give you a wide ranging expertise in internet marketing. These are Profit Lance, Wealthy Affiliate and Affiliate Cash Secrets. If you want to succeed in internet marketing you must invest in yourself and these three programs will teach you everything you need to learn in order to be successful. A virtual internet marketing boot camp.
Honestly, if you invest in these programs and study them for 8 weeks before launching your internet marketing career you will save hundreds , probably thousands, of wasted dollars. Creating an internet marketing empire requires the same principles as housebuilding. You need a strong foundation. If you build a house on sand pretty soon it falls down around your ears. The same is true for internet marketing - that is why the work you undertake at the beginning is so crucial to your success.
Now I am aware that this can be incredibly frustrating because you want to grab the bull by the horns and get going straight away. Please, please, please resist the temptation. Sure, you can experiment, try things out but don’t do so in the hope of making any money. At this stage you are doing things for your own education. Complete the 8 week internet marketing boot camp of Wealthy Affiliate for example and it will be like an internet marketing rocket launcher once you start to apply what you’ve learned for commercial gain.
You may be wondering how internet marketing works. You promote or recommend a product to an internet surfer and they make a purchase as a result of the information you have provided. How do you get paid? Well let me tell you it’s quite ingenious. When a potential customer clicks on one of your promotional links a cookie is placed on their computer which identifies you as the promoter. This stays active for anything between 7 & 90 days - sometimes longer. If a purchase is made within the lifetime of the cookie for the product you promoted you get paid.
The cookie is tracked by an affiliate network and they are responsible for paying the merchant and paying you. So, which affiliate networks should you join? Well I’d strongly recommend you start with Clickbank the market leader for information products. When you start making money through Clickbank you can spread your wings a bit and look at Commission Junction & Linkshare. Clickbank alone will keep you busy for months and many of the products in their database provide additional resources to help internet marketers to help with their promotions.
Affiliate Networks are free to join.and really, you should only join one when you first start out as it takes time becoming familiar with all the offerings.
So at it’s most simple level you now know how internet marketing works. You choose a product to promote from an affiliate network, promote it and if someone buys as a result of your promotion you get paid. We’ll look extensively at promotion at a later stage. For now though, sign up with either Clickbank (recommended option) Commission Junction or Linkshare.
Do you need a website to build a successful internet marketing business? No but. Once you understand the principles of internet marketing as taught by Profit Lance and Wealthy Affiliate you will see that there are many monetization models from which you can choose to build a profitable business. Some enable you to operate without a website, some require a blog (the majority of which can be freely set up), some require a full blown website and some require a combination of blogs, websites and other strategies.
Deciding where to start depends on choosing a monetization model that interests you, your level of expertise e.g. have you built a website before? How much money you can afford to invest and any number of other criteria. Ultimately, you are likely to want your own suite of websites as your business expands but when you are starting out this isn’t essential especially if funds are tight.
What is most important is that you have a plan. You may have heard the expression “if you fail to plan you plan to fail” and I don’t think a truer word has ever been spoken particularly in relation to internet marketing. Coming up with a plan can be tough so make it easy on yourself. How? Follow a system designed by an expert who has succeeded on a massive scale. It was only when I took advantage of the Affiliate Cash Secrets System and combined it with my Profit Lance and Wealthy Affiliate experience that everything started to make sense and I started to make money. And in case you’re wondering you don’t need a website to make money using the Affiliate Cash Secrets System. Take a look at it I think you’ll be impressed.
When I first started playing the internet marketing game I had no clue how things worked. I had read an article that said set up an affiliate account (more on that in a later post), open an adwords account, write an ad, include a link to the product sellers sales page and watch the money roll in. If only it were that simple - needless to say I crashed and burned because I had no understanding or the mechanics of the market. I also had no appreciation of how many different ways there were to make money (there are dozens), how to generate traffic, build a list etc. etc. As this site develops we will cover all of these areas and many many more.
Now following that initial failure research shows that a significant majority of internet marketers quit and that is a shame. I wasn’t for quitting and I persevered. After some time I realized that I needed a proper understanding of the mechanics of internet marketing - a foundation if you like from which I could build a solid money making business model.
Now if you find yourself in the same place my first piece of advice is to stop spending in money on products and stop any promotions that you may be undertaking until you have built an understanding of how and why you are doing it. Once I made that decision my business turned around. Developing a thorough understanding of the mechanics of internet marketing takes between 4 to 8 weeks depending on the amount of time you are prepared to invest. During this time avoid all temptations and focus on building skills and knowledge. Research, practice, understand and only then decide which model to follow and what monetization strategies to use.
So where to you go to learn the mechanics of internet marketing and build that solid foundation that is critical to your success? Well good ones are pretty hard to track down and it took me several months to find a couple I was prepared to recommend unreservedly. They are Profit Lance which is available for a one time payment of $77.00 at the time of writing and is an incredible bargain and Wealthy Affiliate which is a membership site costing $29.99 per month. As I said in a previous post I only recommend products I use myself so if you decide to join Wealthy Affiliate remember to look me up and if you join via a link on this site let me know and I’ll post you some freebies that well help accelerate your progress.
If you’d like to see my mini-reviews of Profit Lance, Wealthy Affiliate and another excellent service I make use of take a look at my review page on Squidoo.
