How To Make Money Online (Really)
I was thinking this morning what a pity it is that so many people have trouble working out how to make money online and end up thinking that it is all a scam.
It’s like doing this:
1. You see some advertising that shows people going for a wonderful vacation in Las Vegas in a certain type of car. You buy the car.
2. You read the manual. Then you open the door and sit in the driver’s seat for an hour or two with the key in your pocket.
3. The car has not taken you anywhere, so you decide that it doesn’t work. You buy another.
4. You repeat steps 1-3 with different types of car until you run out of money. Then you conclude that all cars are a scam, because you bought practically every type of car that there is, but you never made it anywhere near Las Vegas in any of them.
Okay, the advertising didn’t tell you that you were actually going to have to DRIVE.
Does that make it a scam?
So it seems to me that systems for making money online are a lot like cars.
They don’t all work, but most of them do.
Also, most people can learn to use them, even if some find it more difficult than others.
You only need ONE, but you must do what it says in the manual. If there is anything there that you don’t know how to do, you must find out.
In the meantime, you must not buy any more, even though the one that you bought may not be the fastest or the best looking. Only buy things that help you do what you need to do with the one that you already have.
If you do this and it really doesn’t work for you at all, you probably have a very good idea what went wrong. More likely, you will make some money but not enough. Either way, you can now look for another and you will be much better informed about what it is that you need.
If the first system that you buy doesn’t take you as far as you want to go, then provided you really made the most of it, the second one should take you all the way.
What do you think?
I think you hit the nail on the head. Too many people look at the internet as “Easy” money. There is a great sense of pride that comes from working and earning your money.
Best regards,
Richard Hackworth
I agree with your sentiments exactly. I am in the process of learning to drive that car and it does take a lot of effort and expense but I guess it will be worth it in the end if I am actually able to drive the car eventually. Staying focused on just learning how to drive it is difficult. It is so easy to get sidetracked into the “add-ons”.
e.g. You have sent me The Article Profit Formula which is very good but to be able to follow it through I have had to learn (and in some cases spend money on):
1. How to blog
2. What an RSS feed is
3. How to make a squeeze page (which also entails finding out which company to use to monitor the autoresponder
4. How to write articles
Etc. etc.
All very interesting stuff but it is so easy to get side-tracked. You go looking for “how to blog” for example and you end up subscribing to this freebie, that good idea, some other way of doing it. Time has passed and you still have not actually got to drive the car on the road yet i.e. no income has been forthcoming.
Tammy Scott
Tammy, you are right that you do need to spend time and/or money in learning what you need to know for a system and it is SO easy to get sidetracked! But as long as you are always coming back to what you originally wanted to do, and not buying different systems one after another, you are not falling into the really fatal trap. - Rosie
I agree, Rosie. I remember my first car was a “manual”. I remember going around a corner almost on two wheels. It scared my mother half to death (and I wasn’t ever allowed to drive with her in the car again!) Boy, did I ever jerk and jerk and jerk trying to get started. Once I got going, it was sooooo easy. I didn’t want to slow down! But, then I wouldn’t drive for a while and then I’d get in the driver’s seat and try, try, try again. After I got the hang of it, driving that “manual” car was very easy. The same goes for Network Marketing and Online Marketing. Most people try to jump right in and expect to make a lot of money in MLM or online right away. Some do, but 95% or more don’t make the money they thought they would and they simply stop trying or they think that there’s something wrong with the product they are selling or the company they represent; so they go to another company and have the same poor results time and time again. They’ve given up on their dream of being financially free. A lot of people ‘jerk’ around and try everything under the sun - the latest and the greatest - just to try to ‘get going’. Having a successful home based business comes down to one thing… MARKETING. Once those skills are learned and implemented, network marketing is like driving an automatic.
Lana Robinson
Tammy, you are right at the head. people are not making money on the internet because they don’t act what they read. Well I am not saying I’m already make a lot of money but to certain extent I know what works and what doesn’t.
There is an extension to this metaphor in that many people who buy an ebook, system, cool piece of software a/k/a a car don’t know *how* to drive let alone that they have to drive!
In my experience most IM related products are either marketing processes or marketing activities. Strangely this is what most people want to buy (which answers the question as to why are there so many of these products for sale).
To be really successful it’s my experience that you need to build an internet business not just complete marketing tasks!
Great Blog - very interesting