Guide to make money online!

Great Online business ideas are all very well, but you won’t make money online using them if you don’t know how to. To make money you have to formulate a business plan, and for that you must set targets, and targets need a goal. Without a goal to strive towards you will not succeed, so it is important that in addition to the idea, you also know how to use it.

It has often been said that a failure to plan is a plan to failure, and nothing could be truer. A simple goal to set, though perhaps not easy to achieve, is to decide how much money you want earn this year. Don’t be unrealistic and decide on a million dollars in the first 6 monhts, but be realistic: say $75,000 in your first year.

You can then break that down into monthly amounts, starting small and increasing each month, which will give you the basis of your targets. You should then plan how to meet these monthly targets. That is a good sound basis of a strong business.

However, you now have the problem of how you are going to make that money online from your great online business ideas. There is a large number of ways in which you can make money online, some of the most popular being|:

1. Creating your own product or service.

Maybe you know about something or can do something that others will pay for. You might be a children’s entertainer or a hypnotherapist. Perhaps you can write en eBook about breeding dogs, or make a video series on maintaining your own car.

I know of one person that made a fortune by making series of short videos of how to carry out simple household maintenance tasks, such as changing an electrical plug, changing a tap or faucet washer, and even putting in a new sink and laying a carpet.

A simple idea, yet it is one that has a massive customer base. Just think about all these guys that don’t know one end of a screwdriver from another, or all those women that live alone and need some help. That’s one of the best online business ideas I have come across, and he makes a fortune from it.

Think of what you are good at, or what you have knowledge of, and work out a way of packaging that knowledge or these skills in a way that would sell. I am a professional article ghostwriter, and make money online by writing articles for others to use to promote their products and their websites.

2. Sell somebody else’s product

If you are unable to produce a product of your own, then make money online by selling somebody else’s product. Everybody involved in internet marketing is familiar with the term ‘affiliate marketring’ even if they haven’t been involved in it. Affiliate marketing is selling a product for somebody else in return for a commission.

If that product is able to be delivered online or by email - by email or downloaded - then that commission could be 50% or higher, since there is no replacement cost. Unlike a tub of vitamins, an eBook or software application doesn’t have to be produced again once it has been sold, so the vast majority of the selling price is profit. You can therefore be paid more for selling it. 50% is about minimum for such items, and some go as high as 75% or even 80%.

3. Others

Among other ways of making money online are multi-level marketing (MLM), where you recruit others to sell products for you, you receiving a commission on their sales, buying on eBay, and selling the same items for more than you paid for them, buying items in bulk when they are in high supply, and selling at a high price when they are scarce (e.g. certain toys at Christmas time), and many others.

Each of these money-making techniques has one thing in common: you must learn how to achieve your goals and how to market what you are doing online. Even your eBay business has to be promoted by means of your ‘product description’. If you have any great online business ideas that you believe could make you money, it is important that you learn how to use internet marketing properly, and how to take advantage of all the tools that there are out there to help you to succeed.

Most businesses need a web presence, either as a traditional website or some other presence on the web such as a Squidoo lens or participation in social networking. They will also likely require software, and have to learn how to use it, and also learn how to drive traffic to their wesbite and what to do with it once it gets there - potential customers. Your business cannot succeed without customers.

This is where most people begin to fail. In fact 99 people out of every 100 that try to earn a living online fail. They fail for one of 4 reasons:

1. Lack of Planning

They did not have a clear objective in mind and did not plan properly. The started their business on shaky ground and looked on it as a hobby. They fell into one of the main traps of working at home: worked part-time, and took time off whenever they felt like it rather than set out the daily tasks needed to meet their targets and work until they were completed.

2. Lack of focus: Information Overload

They did not focus, and jumped from one program to another. They had too much information, and were unable to give any one method of making money online the time to work for them. They tried too much at one time and so failed in everything.

3. Lack of Perseverance

They gave up to soon. It takes time to build up a successful online business. Unless you are extremely lucky, there is no such thing as ‘get rich quick’. It is not easy work, making money online, but the succesful are those that persevere during and after failure. Most don’t!

4. Lack of Knowledge

This is the least reason for failure. In this internet age nobody need fail through a lack of knowledge - everything you need to know is out there, yet many people try to do it themselves without getting the information they need. Learn from the work of others: do not reinvent the wheel. It may be trite, but it is certainly true.

Use whatever training courses are available out there. I know that it could cost a lot of money, but it is possible to learn everything you have to know without spending any more than twenty or so dollars each month.

You mjust not fail for any of these avoidable reasons. It is a shame that so many dreams are shattered for a lack of planning, focus, commitment and perseverance, and a lack of knowledge. All are avoidable. Put your unique online business ideas into practice by finding out how to do it the most effective way, and learning how to use the tools that are available to you.

You have created your own blog, optimised each aspect of your blog and diligently do regular blog postings. You feel that you are doing a fairly good job and then someone mentions guest blogging. Many people will immediately ask why on earth they should spend extra time doing guest blog posts on the blogs of others. The answer in a nutshell is that by guest blogging you throw out your net far wider to attract visitors to your own blog. Guest blogging expose your own blog to a far bigger audience than would otherwise be possible. The goal of having your own blog is to attract as many visitors as possible and guest blogging forms an important part.

New and fresh

Guest blogging brings you a whole new audience that probably have not read your work before. If your guest blog post is interesting enough they will click through to your own blog to see what else you have of interest. When you have been accepted as a guest blogger on another blog it shows readers that you are an authority in your industry. You have something valuable to say, that’s why you were accepted. Accepting guest bloggers on your own blog brings a new perspective to your own blog as guest bloggers will compliment your own blog topic.

Create a win-win situation for both bloggers

Both bloggers benefit from guest blogging. You as the guest blogger gets a much wider exposure with a new audience. The blog you guest blog for gets exclusive content that is free and fresh. There are many different social networks and guest blogging benefits you greatly here as well. Your own presence for instance on Facebook may not be high, but when you guest blog for a blog that has high exposure there, your own exposure shoots up.

In this way the combined efforts of both blogs bring huge benefits to both blogs. This is an excellent to boost the ratings of both blogs. If you keep an eye on your analytics you will see how well this works within days after you have done a guest blog posting.

Great links and new subscribers

An interesting guest blog post that grabs the attention of readers will have them come to your own blog. If they like what they find, this can lead to many new people subscribing to your own RSS feed as they want to be kept up to date with your new offerings. Guest blogging is a brilliant SEO tool as far as creating back links are concerned. When you guest blog you can include a short informational blurb about yourself.

This allows you to add one or more extra links to your own blog and good back links are highly sought after. Link building with guest blog postings are too valuable to neglect in your own SEO efforts. It is all about throwing your net out as wide as possible and wooing potential web traffic by capturing their interest. Guest blogging simply holds too many benefits for your own blog and website to ignore.

Blogs have taken the Internet by storm; it is now officially called the Blogosphere and it has a huge impact of not only the lives of people, but on business as well. The latest statistics show that approximately 346 million people read blogs; that is a lot of people and an unbelievable number of potential customers that your business could have access to. Therefore it is really not surprising that the business blog was born to make use of this great new tool. The problem could be if you jump onto this band wagon and you have not a single clue as to what you are doing.

Then your brand new business blog could easily turn into a big business flop. Creating and maintaining a successful business blog is not difficult to do, it simply takes planning and knowing what your focus is with your business blog and once you have your motivation firmly in mind you can start creating your business blog as an excellent marketing strategy.

The aims for your blog

A blog is the way for you to connect on a personal level with your customers. The problem with the Internet is that it is a huge market place, a global bazaar and people love to shop all over this giant bazaar. This means you don’t know your customers and they don’t know you. Blogging changes that and makes things personal. With a blog you have the ability to help your clients, by answering their questions, replying to their comments.

Your official website informs them about your products and services; your blog address topics that can give them a better understanding of your business and your products and services. Good SEO can use your business blog as a tool to increase traffic to your official website. Your blog is an excellent form of low-cost marketing and let’s face it, any form of cost effective marketing in these tough economic times should be used.

Blogs have incredible appeal to readers as this in an informal way of interaction between clients, prospective clients and you as the businessman. People can have their say, no matter if it is good or bad and you have a chance to have your say back as well. Readers find blogs far more believable than the official feedback and testimonial sections on any official website.

Content is always king

The same rules about content that apply to your official website also apply to your blog. Content must be excellent, there must be a lot of it and it must have a sharp focus on the chosen subject. Adhere to these rules for content and you will soon get the reputation for being an expert in that field. Keep adding fresh and exceptional contents to your blog will pay off great dividends.

You will attract good incoming links this way from sources that tie in with your blog and this means and increase in your search engine search results listing. The Blogosphere is influential and it is a fast growing part of social networking and a great opportunity for marketing.

Due to its growing popularity, there are many companies and individuals who now offer Search Engine Optimisation services for other websites and businesses. When choosing someone, it is important to select someone suitable to do your SEO as you must make sure it will be as effective as possible for you and your website. Many people do not look past the second or third page of the search engine results so it therefore very important for your business to rank as highly as possible. Search Engine Optimisation helps to set your website apart from the competition as unique and useful for the searcher.

First you should pick someone who has an extensive knowledge about Search Engine Optimisation and the different methods that can be used as there are so many. Knowledge about SEO is essential because they must be aware of what the search engines look for when ranking the websites in the search results and also the rules and regulations which must be followed to prevent your website being banned by the search engine. They must also be aware of the particular methods that would best suit your company and its needs. Organic SEO works best as it complies with the rules set by the search engines and works with them to propel your website up the rankings.

Whether you choose a company or an individual to do your Search Engine Optimisation for you, you must ensure that they have adequate writing and language skills because a big part of Search Engine Optimisation is copywriting. The search engines look for newly-uploaded content that contains many of the keywords relating to possible search terms which could be used to look for the website or services relating to the site. This is important as the content uploaded to the website must not only be new, but also grammatically correct and relevant to the website. It must also read well for people who are reading it…as well as the search engines. They must also be able to conduct research into your website in order to maximise the SEO success.

You must choose someone who is realistic in their targets and doesn’t promise to get you the top ranking in the search engine, as this can never be guaranteed. They must also be aware of what you as a company want to achieve. This good relationship is important because they can then tailor the Search Engine Optimisation project to your individual needs.

It is always good when hiring a company or individual for a specific task that you take a look at their previous work and testimonials. This is extremely useful as you are able to profile them as a business and decide whether their services will be successful in achieving your goals. Good testimonials and feedback are usually the sign of a professional and well-established company and they are therefore more likely to be of use to your business or website.