Oct
How to Prevent Poverty in the Internet Marketing World
Once again, Blog Action Day has amassed numerous bloggers throughout the world to raise awareness of a certain issue. Last year I did a little volunteer copy writing to help the environment, and this year I’ll be helping an issue that hits a little closer to home.
That is… poverty. See, poverty is a common theme amongst almost all “Make Money Online” bloggers. Not just on Blog Action Day, but almost every single day.
Whether it’s the story of get-rich-quick schemes gone wrong, or getting scammed out of lots of money, to hard work with mediocre results and measly checks or income reports that are nothing in comparison to the $30k (or more) that JohnChow.com makes each month. I see it all, over and over again.
In most cases, it’s their own fault. I try to tell you not to waste money on these ebooks, and you can’t expect tremendous results for little work. But for Blog Action Day’s sake, I’ll do what I can to help solve poverty.
And to do that, I present… How to Prevent Poverty in the Internet Marketing World.
This is not a get rich quick scheme, rather, tips to prevent wasting all your money! Here we go:
1. Do NOT Buy Every New Ebook
The easiest way to end up broke is to buy every new ebook that comes out. After you buy a few (at $67 a pop,) you’ll realize that each one says the same thing. If you’re going to buy any of these “make money online” ebooks, then buy one. Just one.
(Investing in your education is great, but when it comes to these ebooks, quality is better than quantity!)
But even better, download one for free. You can actually get a free ebook at JohnChow.com. Or if you don’t mind having the information slightly more scattered, read the “Super Affiliate’s Guide to…” posts at ZacJohnson.com.
Just saving your money on ebooks puts you a giant step ahead of most people!
2. If It Sounds Too Good To Be True, It Is
While the common saying goes, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is,” it needs to be altered for the internet marketing field. In this arena which is rife with schemes, scams, and sleazeballs, you need to go by this mantra:
If it sounds too good to be true, it is!
Here’s just one example – “guaranteed traffic.” This is where you get 100,000 visitors to your website for $2.50. It sounds too good to be true, because it is. The “visitors” aren’t actually human visitors. Instead, they are just robot computers registering impressions on your site.
So you lose time and money and waste bandwidth. And if you have advertisers, and they catch on to this, they’ll be pissed!
3. Start for Free
Now let’s save some more money! You can save some serious money by starting out for free. Domain names and web hosting aren’t that expensive, but $10/month saved is $10/month earned! Kind of…
The easiest way to do this is to start up at Blogger. Yes, I hate Blogger, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a use for it!
Head to Blogger.com, start a blog, put some Adsense ads on it, and weave in some affiliate links. You could do some link building, maybe make some “linkbait” style posts for social media sites, and end up getting some traffic. Seriously.
It’s not likely, but it’s possible!
Just look at these popular blogs that are run for free:
postsecret.blogspot.com
makemoneyforbeginners.blogspot.com
photoshopdisasters.blogspot.com
bikesnobnyc.blogspot.com
oneredpaperclip.blogspot.com
glutenfreegirl.blogspot.com
Talk about an easy PR6 and free traffic!
4. Take Action
Here’s the part where everyone goes into denial… You will have to “take action” if you plan to escape poverty. That means you do something. Instead of complaining, do something about it.
I feel your pain, I really do. I wish that I could sit on the couch and watch TV while millions of dollars are deposited into my offshore bank account, but I just don’t see that being possible.
So as much as it sucks to do work, you actually have to do some work. But I can give you a tip to make things go smoother – pick just one thing.
You know how I said to buy just one ebook? That’s to avoid information overload. Reading new books and switching ideas is a great way to end up in the same place you started. If you want to start a cool blog and make money with Adsense, do it. If you want to setup a niche forum, do it, and don’t stop just because some trendy ebook comes out.
But please! If you know nothing about making money online, don’t start a blog telling other people how to make money online. It’s been done millions of times before, and having one more will just spread more poverty.
Instead of that, why not make poverty history?
Photo credit: babasteve
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Click here to buy me a beer, because damn, I need to get drunk to forget how much internet marketing sucks!
Glad to see you found a way to combine Blog Action Day with your own personal cause. As always, I love your snark and wit but there’s also real wisdom there for those willing to be honest with themselves. I’m glad you’re coaching people on how to be smarter about the whole MMO industry – because more crap ebook offerings only serve to make us all poorer.
Glad you’re posting more regularly again.
May I add that you need to buy the RIGHT ebook. If you’re a complete newbie most ebooks will not cover everything you need to know so you’ll end up searching for the information you need -> you end up buying another ebook (or two). At least that was what got me into my info overload situation (or so I tell myself).
This is another reason why I LOVE blogs!!! Because you can read an ebook author’s posts and see if he/she knows his/her stuff.
I found and subscribed to the blog of a highly lauded author/copywriting guru. Of course, he has an ebook he wants to sell. My first course of action was to subscribe to his RSS feed. He made three posts during the first month of my subscription, all of theme were the “MMO” scam of “flew here to meet with a builder in this exclusive community – I’m so rich – buy my ebook to find out how you can get rich without working hard too”.
CLICK! I unsubscribed and saved myself $67 in the process.
@sucker – love your new paid links section, btw. Maybe you could list Google and get it banned? (Oh wait, you know you’re just going to lose all your TBPR that you’ve worked so hard for, right?)
Good points you stressed out here! I agree that we have to choose the RIGHT ebook and one that is not a scam, lots of this are coming and it’s just a waste of money if you won’t check out thoroughly.
Great post. It always amazes me how many folks out there ask for advice on how to drive traffic to their “make money online” or “make money ebook” sites. I mean, if you have to ask how to do it, why the hell would I want to visit, let alone buy their book??
Great tips Sucker!! With all the free information and how-to’s on the net it is soooooooo lame to buy some high priced ebook!
Thanks!
Great mixture of Blog Action Day with your own personal cause. Blog is great. I don’t know what else to say. I will refer everyone I know.
@Melanie
I did consider Google, we’ll see… but Matt Cutts is paying me so much for the exclusive paid link spot, I think I can afford a vacation now
This is an interesting post.Thanks for sharing the information. Hope to see your new posts.
yeah, i agree, if it sounds too good to be true it usually is. Anything that promises fast results without any effort, is usually a complete waste of time.
wow, thx for advice ^^
i like your writing..im totaly newbie in internet marketing
I think to do any thing first u need analyze then only it will be the good deal
Great posting for those who believe busting into blogging can bring them fortune from making comments on their Blogger or Blogspot sites. Sites like PayperPost make big promises, but offer little help in providing more than $30 or $40 in monthly income.
Awesome advice. I used to buy a ton of books on DigitalPoint forums and most of them were crap. Save your money.
haha so true.. I bought at least five or six e-books before I realized that they were all repeating the same stuff and the authors were making more money from e-books than anything else..
The worst was when I subscribed to a monthly news letter that charged me $80 a month to my paypal and I forgot to cancel the subscription.. that’s way worse than the $20 e-books I bought because that newsletter was crud.
Ahh such a sad thing it is, that the poor internet marketer must feed off any scraps he can find on the street. There’s always light around the corner… or so they say, I guess I can only hope.
Well, I have got to say that I appreciate your wit in your blog, and also get some good info in there. I think the most important fact is that internet marketing simply takes work. There is no easy way to make money.
While I agree with only buying one ebooks, you need to keep pace with developments, at least using a variety of blogs. It’s important to get different advice and opinions on SEO, just picking one source of information and running with it could potentially be a huge pitfall.
now internet market has become the world favourite shopping place , where they easily buy with comparing different products.
Start for free. Thas the best tip you wrote!
You don’t need to buy ppc advertising or anything like that. With google you have great traffic for free!!
Yeah you are absolutely right. Now Internet marketing really stinks.
Buying traffic at $2.50 for 100,000 visitors is a waste of money and bandwidth. They will never convert to leads and advertisers hate fake traffic.
Rif Chia
Thanks for your wonderful “Blog Action Day” tips to prevent poverty in the Internet Marketing world. What you have said is absolutely true, “One can’t expect tremendous results for little work”.
Start for free – I like this.
There is a new book on the internet every second day with lots of tall claims but very few fulfill the promises done by them to the readers and hence they lose their hard earned money.
By the time a clever wheeze makes it to a $47 ebook, it’s tapped out.
Problem is a lot of people are looking for the magic bullet and think they can make money the easy way, there is no such way it takes hard work and persistence.
Thanks for posting…that’s a pretty good article…making money online takes time, its not just all about posting articles but also hard work…
Ok Hayden Pannettierre, or however the hell I spell your name. I’ll take action.
I think the best tip there was dont buy ebooks, most are terrible.
I think a lot of us have fallen for the buying ebook after ebook, searching for the magic bullet that will give us all the answers, the only real answer is to get one or two good guides and get to work, trial, error and testing will teach you of what you need to know
Great article, never really thought of this before as internet marketing was rapidly increasing in popularity and revenue while the physical world was taking an economical knock.
If only you had written that post a year ago and I had stumbled across it. Of course the trouble with picking the first business and sticking with it is the quality of the “program” and “support” that you are getting into. I was lead astray in so many ways but now I have a good support.
Dave
Making money online need a lot of hardwork. It is not just about posting. You need Patient, time, effort etc.
The internet has done some wonderful things for marketing such as being able to surgically target and to create truly one-to-one campaigns. However, the appeal of technology’s razzle and dazzle has also nurtured some bad marketing habits – one of the worst being the focus on tactics over strategy. I think the ebook ‘get rich quick’ mentality that you discuss pretty much sums it up. Many of the best offline marketers that I’ve met have been some of the best online marketers: at the end of the day, it was their focus on the consumer and not the technology or media that gave them an edge.
It’s interesting to see posts like this because you can tell if the author actually knows what they’re talking about. The point about “Do NOT Buy Every New Ebook” is good because i believe, with the right research you can find just as good information out there for free.
well…you must have talant to be on the top of all search engines..this is the to stop it
Great, nice post keep up the good work.
You’ve made some really good points here.
I remember a time when I went through “e-book fever” and read everthing that came my way.
Now, I am doing like you have suggested and focusing on only one program. And yes, it is a lot of hard work.
Your #1 point srtruck me first simply because most info found in these ebooks can be found for free with a bit of dilgent research. When Ifirst started I didn’t have the money to buy all these MMO ebooks so I googled everything sometimes going to even 20th page results just to learn what some guru was selling for $47.
The best advice i got from any ebook was from Harvey Segal’s Ultimate SuperTips.
nice post, I hope your writing can help us not to fall into that poverty holes.
Hi, you have stressed good points..All ebooks are not useful. We can get right info free as well. Your article is very good. Thanks.
Can you list which ones ARE scams and which are NOT? I may actually be interested in buying a scam just to see what one is like.
@caleb
I don’t think I could list them all, but here’s a good rule of thumb:
“If the claims in the sales letter are absolutely outrageous, like making a million dollars in a week by creating free blogs at blogspot.com, it’s probably a scammy book.”
But say, the SEO Book, it’s a book covering the basics of SEO. If you need to know SEO, it’s going to give you a very good lesson to start with.
If you want a great scam for a decent price though, there is this:
http://www.johnbeck.tv/index.htm
And you can read this for fun:
http://www.infomercialscams.com/scams/john_beck_free_and_clear/start/40
Great article, never really thought of this before as internet marketing was rapidly increasing in popularity and revenue while the physical world was taking an economical knock…
I’m still not in the favor of using blogger, you never know when blogger might ban your account for no reason, you can get REALLY cheap hosting and domain, but not blogger!
I’m actually wondering why did you suggest blogger and not wordpress or other blog platforms?
@Online Shopping
You can’t put ads or affiliate links on a wordpress.com account, so you couldn’t make any money with it.
IMHO take action parts is the most important part among all other points you mentioned. People read many interesting things, appraise them for there usefulness but do nothing. Once you quit this routine and start doing some actual work you gonna say bye bye to poverty very soon.
I am using wordpress and I think it is a good choice. By the way, google loves it
I felt that with the blogspot as the domain behind, doesn’t really attract people.As in for what I thought.Do you all think so?
There’s just one rule I go by, and I still have no regrets – use common sense. If the book offers to “make money for you” just think – why would anyone want to sell that knowledge for mere $10? And more importantly why isn’t it discussed on every possible blog?
The Blog is great. I’ve heard it said that if I want to know something, find someone who knows and get them to teach me. It takes a lot of time getting “free” information about internet marketing. The info is there, you just have to spend so much time gleaning it out of the mountain of information avaliable. Thanks
Its always a bad idea to go out buying all of the e-books. In my opinion those e-books are a huge waste of money. You are right, most of the ebooks say exactly the same thing. Its pretty ridiculous the amount of money people end up paying for it. “If it sounds too good to be true, it is!” Unfortunately for many desperate workers out there… its tough to not believe (or want to believe) the marketing scams out there…
-Randy