How to Make It Work

The term internet marketing is a very broad term used to describe methods of generating revenue online; or with the internet as a main component.   As the internet evolves, it creates more angles to reach a consumer base, or market.  For example, segments of certain markets can now be reached via mobile devices (cell phone, iphone, Blackberry).  As new web applications spring up, like FaceBook and MySpace, internet marketers immediately analyze ways to use the medium to market their businesses.

Here’s the whittled down H2MIW analysis of internet marketing (IM):

There are two camps of internet marketers:

1.  Retailers (offering products or services) who engage in IM to promote their e-commece or brick-and- mortar business.  This includes small fry mom and pops and the big boys like Amazon.com

2.  Internet marketing entrepreneurs who are more interested in exploiting the communication and broadcast efficiency of the internet to make a buck, and less interested in settling with “one store.”

The first group is self explanatory.  They use traditional websites to advertise their physical business, or their website is their business– a store with a product line and shopping cart system.

The second group is more diverse and eclectic.  There are some very brilliant marketing minds in this group; many of them quite young.  They understand the powerful reach of the internet, monitor trends and are quick to identify income opportunities.   The successful ones make six-figures a month!

In the course of engaging in internet marketing, here is a rundown of the various models of internet marketing I have come across:

Affiliate Marketing:  affiliate marketers sell other people’s products for a commission.  It’s the same concept as in the physical world, like a car salesman or insurance agent earning commissions for their sales, but supercharged by the powerful reach and efficiency of the internet.  75% of retailers have an affiliate program for internet marketers; perhaps the most famous being Amazon.com.

Affiliate marketing is a very attractive business because most of the work is done behind a computer, at home.  You don’t have to deal with people directly (imagine, no need for customer support; i.e. handling customer complaints, refund requests, etc. — the vendor deals with this).  The affiliate marketer simply brings together, using his own time, know-how and resources, the vendor’s product and the consumer in an electronic medium; i.e., a link to the vendor’s site/sales page.  The link is coded with an affiliate ID of some sort, assigned by the vendor (or intermediary) and the vendor (or intermediary) tracks sales referred by the affiliate and pays him/her commissions every month (sometimes every 2 -weeks, depending on the program).

Vendors selling a product can run the affiliate program themselves (in house), or can use an intermediary, referred to in the internet marketing industry as CPA (Cost Per Action) companies.  There are many CPA companies out there; some better than others.  A popular one is Commision Junction.

Affiliate marketers use many approaches to promote their affiliate links:

• niche/ topical website or blog
• opt-in email marketing
• posting in forums/ discussion groups
• using social media like Facebook and Twitter
• using paid advertising (PPC, text link ads)
• and of course…spamming (don’t do this!)

Information products.  This model has made millionaires out of many enterprising individuals.  The concept is to put together a product that teaches someone how to improve an area in his life; such as financial, health, relationship, or self-improvement/career, and sell it on a website.  Most people who use this model make the product in electronic format for instant download; i.e. .pdf, ebook, video, mp3 file.  It is quite easy to automate the transaction using PayPal or other payment gateway software by creating a “thank you page” that the purchaser is sent to automatically after purchasing the product, which contains the download link to the product.  This is how people make money “while they sleep”– the whole system is automated once you create it!

There is nothing stopping you from making your information product in physical form, too.  You can make audio CDs, DVDs, and hard-copy manuals.  This makes it harder for people to pirate your product, but you have to deal with the hassle of shipping and handling.

The information product model can be used in affiliate marketing as well:  you can sell other people’s information product and get a commission, sometimes as high as 70%!  Check out Clickbank,  Paydotcom, and Revenuewire to get set up.  These sites have an inventory of electronic format downloadable products (usually ebooks, video courses, and software) that you can sell for commission.  The other side is that these sites have an “army of affiliates” who visit every day, looking to sell products offering a good commission.  So you can make you own information product, make it available on these sites, and have other people sell it for you (sometimes thousands!).  Generally, the higher the commission you offer, the more people will try to sell it for you.

The growth curve of the information product model has leveled off a bit, but it’s still a lucrative business model, especially those that address a pressing need (see Alexis Dawes’ Desperate Buyers Only ebook).   The products are typically sold via a long sales page format using bold headlines, fancy graphics, compelling copy, and testimonials.   As more people get used to seeing this, the effect gets a bit jaded and less effective.  But the good news is that there is always going to be “fresh blood” as more people surf online.

Membership/ Continuity sites.  As revenue from the information product model declined, the top gurus of internet marketing turned to “continuity” products.  Whereas the information product is a one-time purchase, the continuity model is a recurring purchase (usually monthly).  The concept here is that this model offers more stability as it creates a streaming income.  It requires less effort and resources to maintain a high level of income, as the customer is automatically billed each month.

Most continuity models involve a course of some kind; for example, how to trade stocks.  They can also be an ongoing information stream providing recorded interviews with experts, case studies, and so on.  The possibilities are endless.  If you can think of something that has an endless supply of content/material that people are willing to pay for, you can create a continuity business model that will bring you ongoing income.  But, you’ll need to provide content that has value, and that cannot be readily found online for free.

Selling ad space on website properties.  Remember this:  traffic = money.  If your niche website is generating 50,000 page views a month,  it’s going to get the attention of advertisers in your niche and you can sell ad space on it.   Place an “Advertise”  button or link on your homepage where its highly visible.   This will link to your rate sheet.  List your rates for text links and banners.

Most advertisers will provide the code for their advertisements; all you need to do is copy and paste into your website.  Make sure to dedicate areas on your website where ads can run.  This may require reconfiguring your current page layout.

Some small business owner websites charge $500 a month for a banner ad and $100 a month for a text link ad.  It can be a pretty lucrative situation, totally within reach.   This is how old media (newspapers) made its money– gaining a large readership base and monetizing their product (newspaper) with advertisements.  Now, thanks to the internet, anyone with enough will and determination can get their piece of the advertising pie.

Joint venturing. ” JV-ing” refers to partnering up with another business to promote your product.  It can be done using many angles.  JV-ing requires a large email subscriber list in order to be successful.  Here’s the way it works:

Let’s say Business A is coming out with a new product.   He is emailing his subscriber list of 5,000 people about twice a week of all the features and benefits of his product (pre-selling) before he makes his product available for purchase (this is called a Product Launch).  Business B happens to have a product that compliments Business A’s so he approaches Business A and says, “I’d like to offer my main product to your subscribers for 50% off (or a one-month free trial).  You can use it as an incentive for them to purchase your product.”  Business A agrees, and incorporates the offer in his pre-sell emails.

As you can see, this is a “win-win” situation:  Business A offers his customers an incentive to buy his product; one that he didn’t spend any time developing which is likely to lead to more sales of HIS product; and Business B “rides on the coattails” of Business A– benefiting from Business A’s list and his advertising efforts; resulting in more sales for Business B (plus, Business B captures the emails of Business A’s customers who  bought his product and can market to them again in the future, indefinitely).

Google Adsense. This is a sub-category of selling ad space on your website, but allowing Google to serve (select and display) the ads.  When someone clicks on these sponsored ads, Google charges the advertiser, depending on the amount he bid for that click.  Well, since your website hosted it, Google gives you a cut

Google has two inter-related business services, Google AdWords and Google AdSense.   Here’s how they work:

A business can buy immediate visibility on Google through AdWords.  Very much like classifieds ads, AdWords ads are those ads you see in the right hand column of a Google search results page.  Sometimes there are three ads at the very top of the page as well, depending on the search term.    The advertiser bids on keywords; i.e., the maximum amount she is willing to pay for a click if:  1) someone Googles the keyword, 2) her ad gets displayed, and 3) the searcher clicks her ad.  The click will send the searcher to the advertiser’s website or landing page (sales page).

Google AdWords ads can be keyword based or content network based, or both.  The previous paragraph explains how a keyword based campaign works.   In the content network selection, Google shows ads on websites participating in Google AdSense.  If you ever visited a website and saw “Ads by Google” somewhere along its borders, that website is participating in AdSense.  Basically, the website owner is using AdSense to monetize her website.  She has dedicated area(s) on her website where Google can “serve” ads that are relevant to the content of the page.  For example, let’s say the website owner has a page on dog training.  She signs up for Google AdSense, creates the code in Google (easy to follow instructions), and inserts the AdSense code into a block area of her webpage.  Google analyzes the content of that page, and serves ads such as flea killer products, dog training courses, etc.

Why would someone want to put Google AdSense ads on her site?  Because whenever someone clicks an ad, Google shares the revenue.   In case you missed it, the ads served by Google AdSense are…Google AdWords ads bought by advertisers!  And remember, they are paying Google $$ per click.

Some people bid big amounts, sometimes up to $100 per click, on certain keywords, like “personal injury attorney” or “car insurance.”  So if you have a site with good content using high value keywords and serve Google AdSense ads, and you do a lot of work to get your site visible, you can make some decent money.

No one really knows the formula Google uses to determine how much commission someone gets from AdSense; it depends on a lot of factors.

The one thing  I don’t like about Google AdSense monetization is that it takes the visitor away from your site.  I would rather the visitor stay on my site and buy something I’m selling.  But there are instances where Google AdSense can be a good monetization choice.

Website Flipping.  In website flipping, you create a website, build traffic to it, monetize it, and then place it on one of the several website-for-sale sites.  The idea here is that you find a good domain name, make a decent website– perhaps 5-10 pages long, add good content, and monetize sections with Google AdSense, affiliate products, etc.  If it’s in a niche that has potential, its pages are indexed in Google, and it earns a Page Rank of at least 2, then your website has market value.  There are people who buy website properties where all the “grunt work” has been done, spice them up a bit, and sell them again; or keep it for themselves to generate revenue.  They could also be buying it for its traffic and good domain name, and make an entirely new website for this traffic.

The way to do this properly is to work fast– don’t spend too much time on the fine details; just get the website up and write good content.   If you spend too much time and resources laboring over it, then even if you sell it for $1,000 it might be a break even situation.   So you have to have experience in website design and content writing.  You can of course outsource this, but make sure you keep your costs down.

Two places to sell your website are flippa.com and eBay.