If You Are Making Money Online, You Are a Liar!

HOW TO MAKE MONEY ONLINE?

There is no such thing. In fact it is a blatant lie. No one makes money online, not even the Gurus. The only people that make money work in the Government mint.

Generally what people mean when they say “Make money Online” is actually earn money online. And we all know there are a lot of ways to earn money online – affiliate programs, selling ads space, selling services, entertainment, advantages, education, fun, adult stuff, products etc. In fact internet businesses are in essence the regular businesses we had prior to the advent on the internet that are now being done on the internet. Does that make sense? I think so. So in essence, the internet is just a platform where you can offer anything to the world – valuable or not – with the expectation that people will buy. The internet is just a marketplace of never-before-seen proportions. It has the potential to bring the whole world to your door (website or blog).

With that said, what I find amazing is how funny people are. So many people will pay Google top dollar just to get to the first page of the search engine for the “Make Money Online” keyword phrase.

Recently I did a research on that keyword phrase and what I found was shocking. The biggest money earners online were not necessarily on the first Two pages of Google!

If you think I’m kidding, type “make money online” and then look for John Chow’s URL and you will be surprised. Meanwhile, the guy makes over $40, 000 monthly from his blog!

I also tried “Make money blogging” and got a similar result. But I did find some obscure Nigerian URL in the top Seven on the first page! (I’m Nigerian BTW so I’m not being racist hereJ)

So what exactly is being on the first page of Google have to do with earning good money online, especially if you are not a product seller with big bucks to use to outspend competition?

Not much I would say. You see, I visited my fellow country man’s side and it was just a mere sales page with products targeted to the Nigerian market.

Earning good money online is just similar to earning offline the only difference is that now; you can do so on an infinitely larger proportion.

Note that nothing has changed with the ageless model of running a business which is based on only one strategy. This strategy is executed by applying countless tactics to use to earn online.

The one strategy is simply  to:

“Deliver Valuable, Recurrently Needed Services/ Products That Can Be Easily used Up and just as Easily Replaced and Over and Over by All and Sundry.”

Of course the time with which you use u the product or service varies from a few minutes to several decades.

Based on this, I think everyone that has one blog or the other and is trying to make the world know more about it is some kind of internet marketer and the term really should not be used to describe an elite group that so many seek to be a part of. This misconception is one of the things the internet can be used for – hype.

I think of the internet as the big magnifier, the ultimate leveler of the playing field – or what else can make Media giants like CNN, FOX news and others connect to a gossip site like TMZ for the breaking news of the death of MJ (my childhood hero by the way).

I will simply define an internet marketer as some who uses the internet as a platform to market whatever he has to offer. Forget the image created by people who want to bamboozle you by elevating IM to a pedestal impossible to reach.

There are different business models available to the internet earner. Some of these include

             Affiliate marketing is one of the major drivers of any business on the internet. Click bank has paid over $1.2 billion in affiliate commissions in the last decade. It is a process where a product or service created someone is offered to middle men (affiliates) so that they can sell it risk-free for a huge percentage of profits. Sometimes commissions can be as high as 75%. The product owner normally provides everything needed for the marketing – sales letter, affiliate link, tracking facility, support etc.

             Web Publishing is the sale of advertising. This has been made popular by Google ads. When you display any ads on your site or blog, then you are involved in web publishing

             Membership site model is a very successful model because it involves recurring income once someone subscribes to a product or service over a period of time. In this age where information can become obsolete as fast as possible, internet users are willing to pay for the hottest, most relevant  information that would help them succeed online.

             Niche Blogging is a web 2.0 based business model where a blogger uses a blog software to create a platform where quality content can be obtained by his readers in his niche, the blog owner drives traffic to his blog which he can then monetize by selling advertisement, promoting affiliate programs, selling his own products etc. In essence he creates an online real estate that appreciates in value based on the value he gives to his readership.

             Social Media marketing is also a web 2.0 marketing done based on a community model like blogging. It involves building a network of likeminded people who meet on social networking sites ( like Facebook, Twitter,etc)  adding value to them and monetizing the network by taking advantage of the opportunities to add value that people are willing to pay for in a win-win manner.

            Electronic commerce is the selling of goods directly to consumers (B2C – Business to Consumer) or businesses (B2B – Business to Business)

             Lead-based Generation Model — Organizations involved in this create value by getting sales leads from their website and monetizing it by offering what qualified prospects need to them.

             Local internet marketing – occurs when a locally based company traditionally sells belly to belly and utilizes the Internet to find and grow relationships and later takes those relationships offline and concludes the business in real life.

           Surveys involves being paid by companies that want feedback from volunteers that they can use for product and market research. Payment is based in the number of surveys volunteers can complete.

             MLM or Network Marketing is a model based on referral sale and commission payment. As the name implies it involves a network of people in a hierarchical structure of up lines and down lines and the success of a member of the network is dependent on his up line and down lines.

             Blackhat Marketing is a fraudulent form of internet marketing where deceptive tactics are employed to drive web traffic to a website or affiliate marketing offer. The marketing tactics used sometimes includes spamming, cloaking within SERP (search engine result pages), or redirecting users to pages they didn’t initially request.

The Internet is a platform that has brought various media to a global audience. its 2-way communication nature in terms of getting almost instant feedback and eliciting responses makes it a unique medium.

Internet marketing has a wide scope because it goes beyond the Internet, e-mail, and wireless media. It includes managing digital data of customers and electronic customer relationship management (ECRM) systems. It incorporates the creative, social, economic and technological parts of the Internet like design, development, advertising, sales, networking, generation of traffic and various models of monetization.

So, you can see that making money online is actually not as easy as some have portrayed it. It involves building a system that creates value. On different parts of the value creation and delivery chain, different people get involved and contribute to ensuring that the customer gets what he wants and earn in the process.

Do you earn online using a model I did not talk about? Why don’t you share it here?

Cheers,

Billy