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How to Make Money Online During the Recession

How to Make Money Online During the Recession

Although we are presently confronted with what is generally thought to be the worst recession since the 1930s, the world of e-commerce continues to grow, showing few sign of peaking anytime soon. In an effort to get the most bang for the buck, savvy businesses and marketers are moving traditional ad spend dollars online in ever-increasing numbers.

This growth has not come without a price. Newspapers and periodicals across the country and around the world continue to fail at an alarming rate as readers (followed by representative ad dollars) continue to move to the Net.

Web 2.0 technologies present new opportunities and hazards

In an effort to make the most of this trend, thousands of astute Web surfers are actively learning to leverage Web 2.0 technologies in order to make money online during the economic downturn.

Just as surely as there are many eager to learn this nascent trade, so too is it certain that unscrupulous businesses and marketers will look to take advantage of these “e-newbies” with promises of riches from programs that “do all the work, while you need only sit back and count the cash.” As we have heard too many times before, “if it sounds too good to be true…”

Most online marketers fail

The simple truth is that most surfers with little-to-no marketing experience who turn to e-commerce as an income source fail. However, it is important to note that failure is no less certain for those who try to make it on their own, than those that fall victim to scammers.

I will elaborate.

There is no better place to start a business than the Web

Despite the fact that most online business ventures fail, the potential for earning vast sums of money quickly is far greater online than off. The Web provides heretofore unforeseen opportunities to anyone with access to a pc and an internet connection. To boil it down to a single factor-the Internet provides potential access to a virtually unlimited consumer base for a tiny fraction of the cost required to reach those same consumers via traditional marketing methods. Those that understand this concept and implement an effective plan to take advantage of it become wealthy.

Brilliant Internet concepts and the riches that follow are not necessarily the fruits of experience

One favorite example of high concept is “The Million Dollar Homepage.” This stroke of genius plan was hatched in August, 2005 by a young Englishman, Alex Tew, who needed a way to pay for university. In short, he decided that he would put up a Web page and sell space by the pixel (at $1.00 per pixel) to advertisers. He earned his million without spending a dime on advertising as Web surfers from around the world visited “The Million Dollar Homepage” just to see for themselves if it actually existed and what such a page would look like.

Of course, such high-concept sites are the exception and not the norm. People have made fortunes small and large with far more mundane ideas.

How much is one “dumb” idea worth?

In 1999 a shopper in San Francisco went in search of a certain type of shoe in a specific size and color. He left the mall tired, frustrated, and empty-handed. Back at home he decided that the task could be better handled online. His only problem was that there was no major online shoe retailer to buy from. That day, Nick Swinmurn founded Zappos.com. “Who would be dumb enough to buy shoes online-without even trying them on?” people asked. Hundreds of thousands of customers and millions of dollars later, Nick had his answer-almost everyone. Despite the recessionary woes faced by most retailers, Zappos did more than $1 billion dollars in sales last year.

Alex Tew’s and Nick Swinmurn’s dreams really only had one thing in common, the fact that they would not have been possible without the Internet and its low-cost access to millions of consumers worldwide.

OK, OK, I get it. But what’s in it for me?

We’re glad you asked, and the answer is, almost anything you want-if you are willing to learn the skills required.

While the internet continues to have many success stories, it has many more failure stories, and those remain mostly unheard. There are thousands of budding entrepreneurs who may have had a good idea, but didn’t know how to effectively market it. Or, perhaps they were top-notch marketers, but had no idea on how to deliver the product cost-effectively. Or perhaps they just lacked the fortitude or the dollars to stick it out.

Please, no more stories; just get to the point. I have things to do.

While the Editors at Top 5 Online Jobs rarely agree about much, we are virtually unanimous in the opinion that most budding online entrepreneurs fail because they are generally undercapitalized and too easily discouraged by the almost inevitable initial failures. Far too often they quit just before reaching the “tipping point”-that magical moment when the idea begins to realize a profit.

From the mouths of hucksters…

If you are old enough to remember get-rich-quick king of “tiny classified ads” infomercials, Don Lapre, you might recall this pitch:

“If you can create and test one tiny classified ad in the newspaper that makes just $30-$40 profit in a week, it could make you a fortune, because the secret is learning how to take that one tiny classified ad that just made $30-$40 profit in a week and to realize that you can now take that same exact ad and place it in up to 3,000 other newspapers around the country…”

You can almost smell the hair gel.

Despite Don’s reportedly questionable business practices which made him subject of many a Better Business Bureau complaint, his thesis was correct. If nothing else, Don understood that the concept of scaling could be used in marketing to multiply a campaign that shows a small but consistent profit into a small (or even large) fortune.

Today’s Web is a Don Lapre dream come true-potential access to a virtually unlimited number of eager consumers-if you can figure out how to reach them cost effectively. And while the ROI on successful Internet campaigns is difficult to match in the offline world, the Web is also a place rife with costly and frustrating hazards that chew up and spit out budding online entrepreneurs with clock-like regularity.

How shall I begin?

The very first thing is to decide what type of an entrepreneur you are or would like to be:

1. The Fiercely Independent Entrepreneur
This person is a strong-willed, highly motivated, self-starter. This sometimes egotistical entrepreneur would rather succeed or fail on their own terms rather than follow in someone else’s footsteps. This is a high-risk, high reward approach and not for someone who is easily dissuaded by initial failures. This entrepreneur’s Achilles’ heel is the tendency to enjoy the hunt more than the feast. However, this entrepreneurial type is far more likely to launch the next Million Dollar Homepage, Zappos or Twitter.

2. The Template Entrepreneur
While also a highly motivated, self-starter, the template entrepreneur allows others to blaze the trail and follows only when they feel confident that the successes of the trailblazer can be achieved without suffering through the same mistakes. To this person the bottom line is the destination, not the journey. They generally prefer fast nickels to slow dimes, are willing to utilize the advice of experts, and are less likely to lose interest in a project once they have achieved success. It is of course far easier to navigate a path that has already been cleared, but the downside to this approach is that if they wait too long, it may be difficult to emulate the pioneer’s results due to the inevitable increase in competition. And while this entrepreneur is less likely to launch the next Facebook, they are also more likely to turn a profit.

What do I sell online?

Here’s where you have to make another big decision – should you begin by marketing your own product/service and keep 100% of the profits, or marketing someone else’s product/service and keep a percentage of the profits?

For persons new to the world of e-commerce, we would suggest that you begin by selling someone else’s product or service. Consider selling your own only after you have demonstrated a thorough understanding of Internet marketing techniques and achieved a satisfactory level of online success.

Affiliate Marketing

Many Internet marketers begin with affiliate marketing-the practice of advertising someone else’s product or service in exchange for a commission for each sale referred.

The methods utilized most often by affiliate marketers include PPC (pay-per-click) marketing, posting links on your own search-engine-optimized, content-related website or blog, banner advertising, and e-mail/e-newsletter marketing. There are of course, other “outside-of-the-box” methods used by savvy “super-affiliates,” but these are rarely revealed freely, as the key to successful affiliate marketing is referring traffic to the seller at the lowest possible cost.

For example, if you were to purchase 1000 clicks from Google by using their AdWords program and you paid $0.50 for each click, and 1% of the clicks resulted in sales, and each sale yielded a $10.00 commission; you would produce 10 sales and lose $400.00. Ouch.

Commission ($100) minus Cost ($500) equals Profit/Loss (-$400)

However, if you paid $0.05 for each click, assuming the same 1% conversion rate, you would profit $5.00 for each sale-a very healthy ROI (return on investment) of 100%.

Commission ($100) minus Cost ($50) equals Profit/Loss ($50)

Scaling Marketing Campaigns (the “Don Lapre Method”) to Maximize Profits

Using the same parameters, an investment of $500 in AdWords clicks would return your $500 investment plus an additional $500 profit.

Commission ($1000) minus Cost ($500) equals Profit/Loss ($500)

Rather than be satisfied with a $500 profit on a $500 investment, once convinced that the results could be repeated with a reasonable degree of consistency, a savvy internet marketer would reinvest profits in increasingly greater amounts. If successful, the marketer would become wealthy in short order.

A Little Online Marketing Perspective

While you don’t run into campaigns with 100% ROI on a daily basis, they certainly exist, and they have and will continue to make Internet millionaires of many. If we were to think of such a campaign as a machine into which you could put a single dollar and have it spit out two dollars a few days later, what that machine be worth? What would you be willing to pay for the plans to build such a machine?

But you don’t need 100% ROI to make a very good living as an affiliate marketer working only a few hours per day from home. A fairly consistent ROI of 50% would be enough to allow you to quit your day job in relatively short order. All you really need are the plans to create your own ROI machine.

Building Plans for Sale

While some “super-affiliates” will take their methods to the grave, there are others that are willing to part with them-for a price. The trick is of course, to get the best possible “plans” at the lowest possible cost. All plans are not created equal.

It is our recommendation that persons new to Internet marketing seek out the mentoring of someone who has already become wealthy by creating high ROI affiliate campaigns (not by selling online courses). Contact this person and offer to work as an apprentice for an hour or two per day to learn the methods used to create and implement high ROI affiliate campaigns. Or simply ask them what they would charge for weekly phone consultation. Or if they give seminars or webinars, begin by attending one. Or if they offer a class, take it. Or if they offer an online course, buy it. Keep in mind that doing so will likely save you the time and cost of many of the initial failures encountered by most if not all Internet marketers.

If you find the right mentor and truly heed their advice, it would probably be difficult not to at least approach their level of success.

Finally: A Word about Work from Home/Online Job Scams

While there are certainly more than enough online scams to go around, it is amusing to hear programs created by some of today’s top online marketers referred to as scams. To keep a bit of perspective it might be helpful to note that a college education generally costs tens of thousands of dollars. Somehow graduates who find themselves amongst the unemployed rarely refer to their degrees as scams. Yet, when someone takes an online course and fails to produce a profit within 30 days, the word “scam” is thrown around freely. We would suggest that students of online courses also examine their own efforts before referring to anything that has been proven to work for others as a scam. The price of a book is never a guarantee of the knowledge within.

 


How to Make Money Online During the Recession Although we are presently confronted with what is generally thought to be the worst recession since the 1930s, the world of e-commerce continues to grow, showing few sign of peaking anytime soon. In an effort to get the most bang for the buck, savvy businesses and marketers are moving traditional ad [Continue]

10 Important SEO Tips For WordPress Internet Marketing

10 Important SEO Tips For WordPress Internet Marketing

WordPress is one of the most powerful marketing tools that are available on the internet today. It can be used to create a blog for your internet business or your very own website to promote your product. What is really great about WordPress is that you can create either of these in a matter of minutes even if you do not know how to do HTML. The key to a successful WordPress blog or website is the SEO Capability. Here a few tips that you can use on your WordPress Marketing blog or website to make it SEO capable.

1. Titles:
In the permalinks section of your WordPress marketing software you have the option of date and name based.  This option will place the year, month, date, and post title in your URL.  For the SEO webcrawlers it is best to have the site of your site appear in the front of this URL.  So instead of using the basic URL you should choose the custom URL and create a link that has your site name appearing first.

2. Page Titles:
You will need to make sure you have good titles on all of your webpages.  Just as you put the site name at the beginning of your URL you will need to do the same thing with your page title.

3. Post Titles:
The post titles that you choose should be clearly written.  Do not stuff these titles with keywords that you are using to target your site or blog. Choose your keywords carefully when you are posting and get those words in your post title.

4. Permalinks:
You need to be sure that you are using permalinks on your WordPress site.  By default your WordPress software contains web URL’s which contain question marks and numbers inside of them. These links are hard for the search engine web crawlers to attach themselves to. As a result your site will not be indexed as fast as it would normally be.  WordPress also, however, does offer you the opportunity to create custom URL’s for both your permalinks and archives.  You will be able to find this option under your Administration panel.  All you will have to do is to choose the options panel then click on permalinks.

5. Tags:
Tags are a great addition to your site on a SEO standpoint. They will enable the search engines web crawlers’ crawl through your site more easily and also it will allow you to create specific pages for your tags and keywords. You can also install the Ultimate Tag Warrior for your WordPress.

6. Autolinks:
You will also need to cross link to your own posts and pages in your content. You do this by linking keywords to your relevant posts.

7. Relevant Posts:
Be sure to post links to related posts under all your postings. This will help the web crawlers that are crawling through your site and indexing all of your posts.

8. Ping Services:
Each time you post or edit either a posting or a page your Wordpress blog can notify a variety of different sites that you have updated your blog.  It is very important that you use this step.

9. Google Sitemaps:
Google has a tool for you that are called Google Sitemaps. This tool will help you index your site and allows you to tell Google which pages are the most important.

10. Categories:
Categories will help you organize your content. If you have your permalinks turned on, the category names will appear in your URL. This is why it is very important that you name your category names very carefully. Try and make sure that you use keywords to name your categories and do not be afraid to make loads of them. WordPress gives you the ability to use sub categories and sub-subcategories so make as many categories you can. This way you are able to down your focus on certain keyword phrases.

Creating a WordPress site that is SEO ready is simple if you know how to do it correctly. Using these steps can help you create a great SEO site in no time.


WordPress is one of the most powerful marketing tools that are available on the internet today. It can be used to create a blog for your internet business or your very own website to promote your product. What is really great about WordPress is that you can create either of these in a matter of minutes even if you do not know how to do HTML. The [Continue]

Tips On How You Can Save Money With Your Affiliate Marketing

If you are thinking about getting involved with affiliate marketing you are probably wondering what affiliate marketing cost you can expect to incur. The good news is that you can start your very own affiliate marketing business for free or very little cost.

Yes, I said free. Though I’ll be honest, that’s not going to get you as far as quickly as if you invested a small amount of money, let me explain why. There are probably thousands of different types of products and services you could become an affiliate for but the real trick is getting customers to your website. You need to get a steady stream of hungry customers to your site if you want to make money.

One of the best methods for generating this traffic is by article marketing. That means you write quality, informative articles about the product you are promoting and when someone reads your article they can click on a link at the bottom of your article and be taken to your website. Not only is this method free it also has the added advantage of helping you set yourself up as a trusted expert.

The downside to this method is that many of the article directories (websites that will let you submit articles for publication) won’t allow you to put an affiliate link in your article, you need your own domain name. There are some ways you can get around that such as putting up pages on sites like Hubpages and Squidoo but that’s not as effective as purchasing your own domain and hosting. You can buy your own domain name for less than $11 a year and hosting can be less than $10 a month. So, while you can get involved in affiliate marketing for free, if you’ve got even a small amount of money it can help you get established a little more quickly.

When you’re first starting out you’ll probably hear a lot about Pay Per Click (PPC). This is a form of advertising that allows you to place ads using topic specific keywords. You will only have to pay for the ad when someone clicks on it and is taken to your site. The amount you have to pay will vary depending on the keyword you’re targeting and is determined by a bidding process.

PPC has a lot of variables and if you’re not careful you can really rack up hundreds or even thousands of dollars. Because of the steep learning curve I recommend anyone who is new to affiliate marketing start with the free marketing methods such as article marketing. They are every bit as effective as PPC but they won’t cost you anything. Then, when you are making more money and have the time to learn to do PPC properly, you can expand…if you want to.

There is nothing stopping you from starting your own affiliate marketing business. The affiliate marketing cost is very low (or even free) and the potential rewards are virtually unlimited. Just remember, that even though you can start this business with little or no money, if you don’t treat it like a business and learn all you can, you’ll never make any money either.


If you are thinking about getting involved with affiliate marketing you are probably wondering what affiliate marketing cost you can expect to incur. The good news is that you can start your very own affiliate marketing business for free or very little cost. Yes, I said free. Though I'll be honest, that's not going to get you as far as quickly [Continue]

Tips On How To Avoid 3 Common PPC Marketing Mistakes

Pay per Click, or PPC, marketing is one of the most powerful marketing tools that are available on the internet today.  But just like any other advertising campaign it needs to be done with careful planning and consideration in order to avoid certain pitfalls that may occur while you are creating your marketing campaign.  If you begin your PPC marketing plan without careful planning first you have set yourself up to lose thousands of dollars and tons of wasted hours.  There are books available that you can read that will help you put a great plan into place for your PPC Marketing plan.

Putting a successful PPC marketing plan is easy though without books if you avoid a few of the more common mistakes that most people make. Note though even if you have discovered that you have made one of the following errors that can be easily fixed quickly and get your campaign back on track.

1.The most common mistake people find themselves doing in creating their PPC marketing plan is using their homepage as the landing strip.  While to most business owners it may seem logical to have your visitors brought to your homepage there are reasons why this should not be done.
• People who will click on your advertisement are most generally looking for a specific item. Instead of bringing them to the home page, create a landing strip for your ad to bring them too.  This will allow you to bring your customers exactly the right spot that they are searching for. This will make them happy because you saved them time and as a result they are more than likely to visit again.  Each of your landing page should be keyword specific relating to your add. It should also not contain any other links or distractions.

2.If your landing page is confusing to your reader you will lose sales as a result.  If you create a PPC that is targeted to the visitors key word it will result in sales almost every time as long as it easy for them to read and understand.  Your landing page should also be part of the keyword that they are searching for.  Make sure that it easy for the reader to find. You should also have several different landing pages if you have several different keywords or topics.

3.Every search engine that is available on the internet today will use its own methods as to where to place your ad.  One of the biggest mistakes that people who are new to PPC marketing make is that they do not tightly target their keywords well enough to get considered for optimum placement on the search engines.  Over 85% of all search engine results are based on the top three ads.  If you are not able to focus your keywords well enough you will not make the top three and have the potential to lose a lot of money as a result.

As you can see the more common mistakes made by new users to the PPC Marketing world are fairly easy for anyone to make. Knowing how to fix them is the key to a great PPC marketing campaign.


Pay per Click, or PPC, marketing is one of the most powerful marketing tools that are available on the internet today.  But just like any other advertising campaign it needs to be done with careful planning and consideration in order to avoid certain pitfalls that may occur while you are creating your marketing campaign.  If you begin your PPC [Continue]

Important Tips On How To Reduce Your PPC Marketing Cost.

As a small business owner you know that PPC advertising is a huge market on the internet today. PPC marketing is best well suited for those websites that have not yet established themselves in the world of the search engines.  But PPC does have a downside as well. PPC can cost you thousands of dollars in marketing dollars if you do not take time to carefully plan out your PPC marketing campaign. Against popular PPC marketing is not just selecting a few keywords and designing your advertisement, actually there is much more involved. There are tips though that you can use to reduce your PPC marketing cost and create a great marketing campaign as a result.

1. Competitors
The best way that you can start off your PPC marketing campaign is to check out the competitors.  Look and see what kind of strategies that they may be using to market their business. There are tools that you can purchase that will help you have a fair idea of the advertising strategies of your competitors.  The most important thing for you to pay attention to when you are looking at the competitors ads are the keyword placement, ad body, and where the ads are being placed on their site.

2. Keyword Variations
It is important for your PPC marketing campaign to incorporate proper keywords in suitable variations throughout your website. If your keywords are not placed properly then all your other efforts will be effortless.  You need to take considerable time when you are creating your keywords. Careful research of what keywords people are searching for will aide you in your keyword search.

3.Keywords to avoid
If you begin your PPC campaign off by using hypercompetitive keywords you are setting yourself up for spending tons of money and your marketing budget will dry up quickly.  However there are a lot of low cost keywords that you can use with proper matching techniques that will be able to save you money in the long run.

4. Call to action terms
Your call to action terms is very important to your PPC marketing campaign.  If you use words such as click here or buy here customers will not be as apt to follow the directions because they feel it is just a high priced gimmick.  However if you use the words sale, discount, or even buy 1 get 1.  These are terms that the customers are looking for and are more apt to click on the links as long as you deliver what you promise on the other side.

5. Honest
It is ok to make a mistake but be honest and correct it and apologize to your visitor. Also when you are using PPC marketing all your information should be honest with no false information. The false information will turn your customer away. It will also leave your site with a negative reputation. If you are practicing dishonesty in your site you are only going to accrue the cost with no returns in the end result.

6. Review your ad performance
Make sure you check on your PPC ads on a daily basis. This will allow you room for fixing any errors that you may inquire.  It will also allow you time to optimize your site if you are not seeing the results that you are seeking.

Making money with your PPC marketing campaign can make you tons of cash if it is done correctly. The more time and effort that you put into the PPC marketing campaign the more revenue you stand to generate in the end.


As a small business owner you know that PPC advertising is a huge market on the internet today. PPC marketing is best well suited for those websites that have not yet established themselves in the world of the search engines.  But PPC does have a downside as well. PPC can cost you thousands of dollars in marketing dollars if you do not take time [Continue]

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