Posts Tagged ‘online business’

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How Do You Make Money with Internet Marketing?

June 16th, 2009

Internet marketing is such a broad term, that it really would take a long post to explain exactly how to make money with internet marketing. It would take a book. Heck, it would take several books to start to crack that subject. I am definitely not an internet marketing expert per se, but I do know a little bit about it.

The reason I decided to write this post is because I spoke to two people today who both asked me this very same question. I thought it was a sign that there are a few people out there who just have no idea how people go about making money online with internet marketing, affiliate marketing, blogging, etc. They understand that you can sell advertisements on a blog or earn referral fees for products sold from links on your site, but their understanding stops at how people actually get to your site, how you set up a site, how you decide what to write about, and how to increase the traffic to your site.

This post will tackle a few of the basics of how people make money internet marketing.

Getting Traffic to Your Site is Key.

The real thing that helps people earn money online is website traffic. There are basically three way to get traffic to your website. The first is organic search, which is when web surfers find a page of your website or blog from a search engine like Google, Yahoo, or the brand new MSN search engine Bing. If your site is relevant to a search query, there is a chance that it may pop up and will earn a new visitor who is looking for information or has a problem that needs solving or is looking for a service.

If you’ve done your job, then you may get a new visitor to your site.

The second way people bring people to their site is from links. If you get links to your site, then that is another chance for people to find your site from another site. It’s crowded out there on the WWW, so the more links you get back to your site, the better. Search engines may also start to give your site some more relevance if you get links from related and relevant sites, which means your pages may appear higher in search engine results pages. Obviously, link building is something that people who are trying to make money online through internet marketing pay a lot of attention to. Getting relevant, high quality links is one of the keys to internet marketing. Look at it as your website or blog receiving a vote from another site that pushes it higher and makes it more popular.

The third way to create traffic to your website is by purchasing advertising. A typical way people do this is with the Adwords PPC program. PPC stands for pay per click, which is exactly what you do. You agree to pay a certain amount every time an internet surfer clicks a text ad that appears on websites (through the Adsense advertising program) or in the search engine results. The blue text ads you see at the top of the major search engines are PPC links. If you can pay a low per click rate, and can sell advertising at a higher rate, you can make some money off of a transaction of this kind.

Now that You Have People Visiting Your Website, How Do You Make Money?

To make money with internet marketing, you need to have traffic to your site and you need some way to monetize that traffic. People monetize their sites in many various ways. Some webmasters and bloggers simply broker their own deals with people who pay a certain amount for a link or a banner on their site.

Others use affiliate product links on their sites and earn when a visitor makes a purchase through their site. CJ.com, Clickbank, and Amazon all provide ways for you to earn money from the traffic to your website.

Perhaps the most popular way people make money online–especially in the beginning–is with the Google Adsense program. This is a fairly simple ad network to implement on your site, but it’s not necessarily easy to make money online with this program. As I mentioned above, you can earn money with internet marketing schemes that involve paying for traffic and then converting that traffic into a sale or a higher priced click on an advertisement.

The amount of money you earn online also depends on the niche that your site falls into. If you run a blog about cars, you may earn more money than if you run a blog about movies. If your online business makes and sells antenna balls, you may earn less than if you sell real estate classes. The reason is that the products associated with cars and real estate are more expensive than the products associated with movies and antenna balls. A muffler can cost a hundred bucks, while a DVD costs $19.99. Logically, the money you can earn from a more expensive product will be greater because the person selling that product has a larger margin (usually!).

Making money with internet marketing also takes diligent work and a lot of trial and error, just like in any other kind of job. If you have money to invest in your online business internet marketing efforts, you will be able to get up and running a little bit more quickly than if you have no money to put into your business.

People earn a living in many different ways online. You can find all kinds of businesses and services on the internet, as you most likely know. The internet marketing angle really comes in after you know how you want to make money online. If you have a service to offer–for example, you are a lawyer who represents people who have been in accidents due to drinking (or whatever it is you may do)–then you can start to try to target keywords in your PPC campaigns. Say you live in the city of Austin. If you could get visitors to your site who are looking for a term like “Austin DUI Lawyer” then that is highly targeted traffic that may convert into a sale or a consult. The person who searches for this term in Google and gets to your site may have their cell phone in hand ready to dial a number.

So make sure you have your office phone in big lettering on the front page. The internet marketing is what you do after you know what you want to sell or what service you have to offer. Some marketers are more like “information entrepreneurs” and set up blogs that are built around specific keywords and have strong SEO qualities to them. The goal is to create traffic and then convert into ad clicks and make money online that way.

As you may be able to tell, there are many ways you can get started in your quest to make money internet marketing. Some people go the content site route and monetize with affiliate links and ppc ads. Others go directly to pay per click campaigns and “push” affiliate programs.

Email Marketing

One thing that is unanimous in the internet marketing business is that use of email lists and email campaigns is effective if you do it right.

For your own information (as at this point you may not be ready for this kind of software), there are several choices when you decide to start email collection and email marketing. One company is Aweber (read an Aweber review) and another is GetResponse. Many people look at highly targeted email lists as the holy grail of internet marketing. Maybe it will help you in your business!

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6 Online Business Myths that are Way Off

June 13th, 2009

Just like any other human venture, online business is burdened with collective beliefs, common knowledge, and myths that just are not true. Here are a few of the myths.

1) Succeeding in online business is easy. This may be a point that I haven’t quite hammered home on this site. In fact, I may make internet business seem a little easier than it really is. This is far from the truth. Internet business is just as hard as any business out there, just as competitive, and can be just as demoralizing. That being said, if you are a superstar or a hard worker with great ideas, you will climb to the top.

2) Online business takes a different skill set than “normal” business. Online business is just that, business. Everyone who has a website talks about “social media” and “web 2.0″ and the amazing benefits tools like Facebook and Twitter create for online businesses. These tools do create a lot of amazing opportunity for those who know how to use them to stay connected to their audience.

But if you don’t know how to connect to people in the first place or have a valuable service or product to offer, then these tools are not going to magically help you get your message out and make sales for you.

If you have sales skills or marketing skills or the ability to rally people around you, then you will be able to transition right into the internet business world. The same rules apply. Create a great product, give great service, and find the people interested in your product. Hit it out of the park for people, and you will win.

The only difference is that instead of having customers come into your store on the street, your store is now visiting your target audience via computer screen in their living rooms. Or on a beach in Jamaica that has wifi.

3) Online business is for tech people. This couldn’t be farther from the truth. Sure, it helps to have someone who knows their way around a computer, but internet tools are so easy to use that you really do not need much technical or design expertise. If you can use a keyboard and a mouse and are willing to put in the effort and learn about things you don’t know much about, then you will be able to create a viable online business.

Working on the internet can also consist of your direct skill set. ?If you’re a writer, you can start a freelance writing business, and if you are a web designer or social media pro, you can do the same. ?You can even become an information entrepreneur and create informative blogs based on different themes and monetize them in many different ways. ?For the content writers out there, read my post about how to make money with Hubpages.

4) Internet marketing is just spam. Sure there is a lot of spam out there, but there are hundreds of thousands of legitimate companies doing business online. Every single brand name company has an internet presence. If they don’t, then they don’t exist. There is nothing shady about doing business online. In fact, I would be surprised if in two years you will be able to do any business at all without using the internet.

As people gravitate more and more to the web to do their shopping, to find their directions, to communicate with their friends, and to plan trips and flights, there will be more opportunities for online businesses of all kinds. If you aren’t preparing your small business for an all-internet world, then you may be left behind.

5) I can’t start an online business because the Internet is too crowded. The internet is crowded and it gets more crowded every day. But guess what, the streets of your town are also crowded with businesses, but new businesses start and old businesses fold every day.

Google and other search engines are becoming better at weeding out the fraudulent, worthless, and spam sites, which makes it easier for the high quality online businesses to shine. Search engine traffic is a huge part of success on the internet and if you play by the rules and create a great product, service, or entertainment, you will rise to the top, as the cream often does.

6) I don’t have time to start my online business. Building an online presence for your small business is vital to your success going forward. There are few companies that will be able to avoid doing business online. A website or an e-commerce store selling your product should be a priority for you.

A good (and easy way) to start is by creating a blog. You can even do it for free. Start a free blog at blogger.com or wordpress.com, find a custom theme online so it looks a little more professional, and start pumping out content and your message. There are so many things you can do with a blog to promote your company and your brand. Even just getting out there and promoting yourself will help you a great deal.

Just like in anything, the people who work the hardest and test different ways of doing business to find what works will be the most successful. The thing that the internet does for business is the same thing it does for communication–it speeds it up. This means that you can rise quickly, but you can fall just as quickly.

One of the best things the internet provides though is free access to your target audience. You can find and reach out to your community on so many fronts, it’s ridiculous. And you can do much of this for free because all it takes it time and the willingness to do good work. Getting your message out and driving targeted traffic to your web presence are both important element in the online game. But having an amazing product or service is the most important thing.

Create an amazing product with a great story behind it and that fulfills a human need or solves a problem in an interesting or new way, and you just might be the next online success story.

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Make Money Online with Hubpages Part 2: Backlinks

June 10th, 2009

This piece is about one strategy you can use to help you make money online with Hubpages.

Hubpages, as you may know, is a website where you can publish content and earn money for your work. Read my first article about the site at the link above, then come back to this one. Or just read on.

You can write about anything you want and have the option edit your content anytime you feel like it. One of the best parts about making money with Hubpages is that you can earn residual income for as long as the website is around, and it will be around for a long time.

There are many reasons why writing at Hubpages is a worthwhile endeavor for you if you are trying to make money with an online business, or have a blog you want to create links to, or just want to write some content and earn some income from it.

First of all, Hubpages is a well-respected site that gets a lot of love from search engines. Writing at hubpages is like having a head start in the search engine wars. This brings up an important point. One of the main elements that will allow you to make money online is traffic. Traffic is the lifeblood of internet marketing and online business.

Look at it as a store owner would. The more people you get to come into your store, the more sales you will make. This can be translated into Adsense clicks, affiliate sales, or referrals in the online environment. Traffic is a key part of the game. And the more targeted this traffic is, the higher the probability you have of getting a conversion or having an action occur. Obviously there is more to making money on the internet: copywriting, branding, actually having something of value to provide, or in this case, providing useful well-written and highly searchable content. But high traffic numbers is how websites become online money-making machines.

One of the strategies to writing on Hupbages and earning money from your efforts is to write more than one “hub” on the same topic. The more you write about the same thing, the more likely you will look like an authority on that subject. Obviously, to write a lot of content about the same thing, you probably will actually have to be an expert on that subject. But you can also learn as you go. Writing is one of the best ways to learn things and solidify ideas in your mind.

Writing about the same topic will also give you more opportunity to increase the rankings of similar content. Say you have an 800-word authoritative hub about the best ski resorts in California. You spent a lot of time researching keywords, reading about the resorts, and clearly presenting the information to your readers. This can be a very good piece of content for you. If you have three or four other related hubs, you can use them to create anchor text links to give your authority hub a little bit of a boost and create some more traffic to it.

Your “support” pages should be directly related to the main authority page you are looking to link to. In the example I use above about ski resorts, these can be pieces more specific to certain resorts. One could be about Mammoth and another could be about Vail. If the main keyword phrases (and related ones) you are working with are also strong in these pages, and even in the title, then links out from them will be even stronger.

When you create your links, you want to create anchor text using the phrases you are focusing on. In the example used here, the phrase you would want to link out to your main hub would be “best ski resorts in California.” It is much better to be descriptive in the hotlink you create, rather than just linking with text like, “see my other article about this topic here.”

You can do this with several of your hubs to create several relevant links that will give the page you want to promote more direct traffic and relevant keyword links that will help move it up the in search engine rankings. The more targeted keywords and links are, the more likely they will be of interest to web visitors and the more money you will make online.

Websites (and web pages) that adhere to web standards of copywriting, search engine optimization, and linking practices are more valuable than those that don’t. If you think from the point of view of a potential web surfer and do your best to create informative, well-written content that is useful, then you will be successful.

Remember that content is king and high value content will gain more natural links from other websites and more return traffic. The more effort you put into your content on the front end, the easier the entire process will be for you. When writing your hubs, take the time to make them as helpful, informative, and unique as possible.

Sign up for Hubpages and start writing and earning today.

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3 Reasons to Start an Online Business

May 16th, 2009

Many people starting a small business today are gravitating to the internet as their main “front” of doing business. I’m sure this shouldn’t surprise anyone reading this.

There are myriad reasons why starting an online business is a smart move for entrepreneurs. Here are three.

1) Websites are highly scalable. This means that you can get your product, message, or service out to anyone around the world without leaving your desk chair. And thousands of people can look at your ecommerce store or your informational blog or your sales page without leaving theirs.

2) No brick and mortar. You don’t need a physical store to sell your goods. There are associated costs especially if you make your own product, but you don’t have to pay rent for a storefront or pay the heating bill.  You can run your business from your living room (or a beach in Jamaica that has wifi.) You don’t even need to pay for an office. More money can go into development of your product, content, or service.

3) The legitimacy of the online marketplace is increasing. Many people shop exclusively online due to the convenience and ease with which you can compare products and prices. ?As shopping online becomes more ingrained in our society, as safety measures increase, and as people become more comfortable buying products on the internet, this kind of business will become even more popular.  If you create an online business, you can rest assured that there will be plenty of opportunity to make sales.

I don’t mean to say that starting a successful online venture is easy by any means because it’s not. But never before in history has it been easier to disseminate your message to the people of the world for such little cost.

The real trick is coming up with something interesting to say or an amazing product. Once you have that down, it’s just a matter of showing people. And that’s what the internet is so good at helping entrepreneurs accomplish–in fact, the high speed transfer of information is just what it was created to do.

Read another post about online business myths.

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