Is Internet Marketing Just Another Fools Gold Rush?
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There’s a well known story that the only people who got rich during the gold rush era were the smart business folk who sold the tools to help the prospectors search for gold - the shovels and picks and so forth.
There were thousands of miners and a limited supply of gold. Those who got in first or were lucky, struck it rich. Their story spread far and wide, encouraging others to chase the same dream, feeling the hope and motivation that comes when you hear others success stories.
Sadly, most left empty handed, in debt and bitter (or dead!).
Smart entrepreneurs saw a much more reliable opportunity. When you have thousands of people experiencing a desire for something with such passion, you can sell them tools and resources to help them meet that desire. While there was no guarantee of gold, there were enough people trying to find it, that businesses who served the gold-digging industry profited a lot more than the average miner ever did.
A comparison has been made between the gold rush era and what we are going through online today in the Internet marketing industry.
- We have a bunch of people “mining for gold” trying to make money from the Internet.
- They are inspired by those few success stories they hear about others who have “struck it rich” online.
- And there’s a small crowd of business folk teaching how to make money online, who are themselves making good money supplying the “miners with tools”.
So the question needs to be asked: Are the only people profiting today selling tools to the struggling miners who are foolishly digging for gold by trying to make money online?
One Point Of View
It’s true a lot of people make money teaching others the techniques to make money, or selling software that exists to help with this activity. If you read my blog for long enough you will see plenty of coaching programs, scripts, reports, MP3s, DVDs, seminars and conferences that all exist to serve the needs of the prospective Internet marketer.
Unfortunately, many people who never actually earned a dime on the web are spending their entire time trying, and usually failing, to sell the manuals, courses and scripts that help people to earn a living online.
They are selling make money products without every having made money, or put another way - it’s like the blind leading the blind!
On quick inspection you might even look at the Internet marketing industry as a modern day pyramid scheme, with the few profiting marketers at the top - those who got in first or early when the craze began, making money selling hope to those who came after, pushing the dream of making a living online knowing full well that most people will never realize that outcome.
What Is The Truth?
I recently had a conversation with a person who clearly considered the current Internet marketing boom a temporary fad.
The gist of his argument was that everyone, including myself, who sells training products to people to help create an Internet income stream, will face tough times eventually as too many people are burned, realizing no result despite spending hundreds or even thousands of dollars on courses and products to help them start an Internet business.
In some ways he’s right.
Many people do buy courses and products and then proceed to make no money. The usual reason why is because they simply fail to follow through and take enough action to get a result. Some try for a while, but for all kinds of reasons (technical challenges, poor choices, bad mindset, lack of patience, bad timing, life circumstances, change of direction, laziness, etc) they just never meet the money goal.
Some of these people are not going to feel very satisfied with their experience, especially if they put in a lot of effort for little reward. They may become totally jaded about the whole industry and consider all Internet marketers scammers.
Will this mean an end to the “gold rush” and is our entire industry based on false hopes?
Personally, I don’t think so, for many reasons.
I agree only a minority will actually reach the point where they do make enough money online to quit their jobs and that’s a discouraging situation. I also agree that there are a lot of junk training products out there and marketers who focus on selling hope without much substance in what they actually provide in their products.
However, there are quality marketers operating today, people with proven records and effective strategies and tactics to teach.
There are training products that if followed by a diligent and persistent person, will deliver results. There are experts in our industry who have made millions running real businesses that have nothing to with “mining for gold” on the Internet. There are established practices and concepts that work, which are not new ideas, they are based on marketing principles that were proven successful long before the World Wide Web existed.
Perry Marshall is one such example of an expert who delivers sound advice without a hint of selling hope or hype. His Pay Per Click training materials have helped thousands of real businesses, both big and small, make a ton of money selling in all kinds of industries. These are sound proven tactics that are genuine tools for making money, when used by the right people in the right circumstances.
We are not talking about fighting for a limited pool of resources, which is what the gold miners were doing. We are talking about using strategic processes designed to leverage an abundant source of wealth: servicing the needs and wants of the human race.
Humans always need and want things. Needs and wants are not a limited resource like gold.
Abundant Resources and Growing Demand
We are still very much in the early days of the Internet marketing industry. You can be confident of this simply by looking at the growth rate of the Internet. As long as the web grows, more people come online, many of whom will spend money and some who will want to learn how to make a living online too.
All the variables are trending upwards. More people are becoming comfortable using their credit cards to buy stuff online. More services that empower people and merchants with the tools to conduct commerce online (shoppingcarts, PayPal) are created each year. People from countries like China, where spending money online is not mainstream, will become more e-commerce savvy, driving huge demand for products and services as their massive populations become online shoppers.
It’s getting easier, more people are doing and it and a general awareness of the Internet as a business, shopping and wealth creation tool is forming.
This is a growing industry full of people just starting on the education curve. There are so few people who even know what Pay Per Click is that it will be a long time before the Internet marketing industry “fades away”, if it ever does. For that to happen, the Internet itself, or the way we consume goods and services online, will have to change or disappear and barring any major disasters, I just don’t see that happening.
You could be cynical and say that sure, that just means there is a consistent stream of “new lambs for the slaughter” who are going to get burned by evil Internet marketers selling hopes and dreams, and yes, many budding entrepreneurs will walk away unsatisfied with their experience, but that’s human nature. You can show people how to do something that is beneficial for them, like eating healthy, but that doesn’t mean they will follow through.
The fact is, for those people who have the willpower, the right mindset, who are willing to push through the setbacks and who follow in the footsteps of those who have already succeeded, opportunity abounds in the Internet marketing industry.
As long as business exists, people will develop new ways to market on the Internet, which means teaching Internet marketing is not a fad, it’s a growing industry ripe with opportunity.
But Isn’t There Already Too Much Competition?
If there is so much money to be made teaching Internet marketing, and clearly a lot of people already do it, isn’t it foolish for any new people to consider entering this market?
If this is a pyramid scheme, then the boat has well and truly sailed, right?
No, definitely not.
I had a new Blog Mastermind student (Mike) who posted in the private members-only forums asking what niche he should start his blog in.
Mike listed a bunch of his interests and activities from his life he could start a blog about and also talked about launching a blog that would be very similar to mine - a chronicle of how he has made money online.
In most circumstances I’d tell this person to steer away from the Internet marketing niche, but in this case a couple of things he said indicated that it might in fact be a good choice.
- He explained that over a 9 year “career” online (4 years full time) he has made $300,000. Not a small sum of money even if it is spread over several years.
- Yet, despite how much money he had made, currently he still needs to find a job.
My assumption is that a lot of what he focused on previously online was very much temporary money makers. He made good money, but the income stream dried up quickly each time.
Regardless of the reason, as you can no doubt see, Mike has stories tell. He’s made money, yet he’s not financially stable. How did he make money? What went wrong that he can’t keep doing it? There are questions we want to know the answers to and that is the foundation for a great blog in the Internet marketing niche.
Mike has done something. He’s taken action and experienced both good and bad results in his attempt to run an Internet business. This means he has materials from which to draw upon to help others. Most people who start a blog or website aimed at selling make money products do not have this experience to draw on, which is why I tell them to stay clear of it.
When you are in a situation where you can distinguish yourself through experience or education or by being an action taker, then you can succeed in the marketing niche. You still need to find something unique and pick a target market to focus on so you stand out from the crowd, but if you can make it work, Internet marketing is a great topic area for many reasons.
Why Internet marketing is a great niche:
- The commissions on affiliate products are some of the best available in any industry with a standard of at least 50%.
- People who sell Internet marketing products put together comprehensive launches with fantastic free resources you can be happy about giving away because you know they benefit your audience regardless of whether they buy anything.
- Comprehensive launches also mean, generally, that you sell more product too. It’s much easier to sell something when the free launch content is good stuff.
The Internet marketing industry “get” affiliate marketing. They know how to put together affiliate campaigns, pay out generous commissions and understand that their affiliates are key for big success. They do the math and see that even making a loss on initial sales is a profitable model because the lifetime value of a customer is what matters. The back-end sequence of products and services create the profits and hence they can afford to pay out big commissions - as much as 100% - which is clearly a huge motivator for affiliates to promote their product.
Right now there are only a handful of smart marketers in non-Internet marketing niches that leverage affiliate campaigns well, which hopefully will change over time as more people in other industries come to understand the power of an affiliate army (and there is yet another education gap that is ripe for an emerging internet marketing teacher to fill).
You Don’t Have To Be At The Top Of The Food Chain
Internet marketing is not a pyramid scheme, but there are definitely layers to it, but that’s a good thing. It enables any person to carve out their own specialty and make very good money doing so, no matter how late in the game you join.
While you may not totally understand how to manage a good affiliate campaign, or run pay per click ads like Perry, or market with blogs like myself, or do search engine optimization like Aaron Wall, as long as you know something, or you are prepared to go through a training process, you can be an expert. All you need to know is more than someone else knows who desires that knowledge, and then sell it to them (you can always make money selling to beginners too).
This is why a person like Willie Crawford, and many others, can do so well teaching Internet marketing basics to small businesses. What Willie teaches might be common knowledge in Internet marketing circles, but it’s not to most people, including offline small business owners, who want to learn how to use online marketing to grow their business. They have marketing budgets in the thousands of dollars that they are willing to spend on training or marketing services, and all you have to do is learn how to get the basics right - some pay per click, maybe how to set up a blog and do a little SEO, and bam, you have a business.
It might seem incestuous, but there is no reason why you can’t take an online course in anything - pay per click, affiliate marketing, blogging, search engine optimization, social media - and then simply re-purpose everything you learn and apply it to a market you can tap into (think differentiation by geography, age, category or any social or economic demographic). You don’t come up with the ideas, you just learn how to apply and sell them to a different market that you can introduce to the concepts. That is all market differentiation is - taking what already works and applying it to a different subset of the population.
How To Succeed At Internet Marketing
Given the scenario I’ve painted through this article, your path, if you are interested in profiting as an Internet marketer, should go something like this -
1. Study the true experts. Find people who have the proof, the endorsements, the third party testimonials and a style of teaching that resonates with you and soak up as much as you can from them.
2. When studying other’s work, don’t just learn what they teach, observe how they teach and how they run their business and replicate what works that is applicable to what you are trying to do.
3. Avoid people claiming expertise selling products and services that seem too good to be true, which can’t be backed up, where the focus is more on unrealistic dreams than tangible outcomes.
4. Take what you learn and apply it to a specific task or group of people - something you could eventually become the expert in. If you plan to service others, practice what you learn by delivering value to clients and then ask those clients to endorse you.
5. Once you have your niche and a little history behind you, start thinking about going deep in your market.
The important thing to realize is that yes, there are scammers out there, but there are also teachers offering proven techniques and although you face a lot of variables that may stop you from succeeding even when you have the highest quality information, the greatest roadblock is you, so if you get past that, your chance of success is VERY good.
From there it just gets easier.
Internet Marketing Is Serious Business
Internet marketing is a branch of marketing and marketing has been fundamental to business since people began trading things. Marketing has long had a bad reputation because people associate the term with things they find annoying, like TV commercials, billboards, telemarketing and door-to-door sales people. The same thing is now happening with Internet marketing.
Despite the sometimes bad reputation, if you want to make money on the Internet you have to engage in some form of marketing. As long as our society is driven by money, marketing will remain a legitimate activity and serious opportunity for those who want to learn the skills…
And it’s not going away.
Yaro Starak
Internet Marketer
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The internet is still really in it’s infancy…the possibilities truly are limitless. As the internet grows, matures, and evolves so will the marketing opportunities presented. Those who learn, grow, and adapt with the changing face of the internet will prosper, this is true with internet marketing or any business really.
Excellent points, Yaro.
Following up on one of them, I’d say the vast percentage of people trying to make a go of it on the net are not even cognizant of the term “internet marketer.” When you get immersed in a scene, it’s sometimes difficult to see the larger picture.
The larger picture is that there are millions of people who want to succeed online. And they look to those who have done it and can lead the way. As in the scammers offline, there will always be those who will take advantage of those wanting to learn. But Yaro’s suggest is a wise one: make sure you’re learning from someone who really has made it AND who can easily communicate his successful actions to a broad audience. Ideally, learn from someone who seeks to exchange in abundance by making a good amount of very helpful content freely available.
Additionally, there ARE many people succeeding online without the help of the “internet marketers.” They took proven principles from the offline world and applied them online, perhaps struggled through some new concepts in the online world, but are busy making excellent incomes selling everyday products: vitamins, jewelry, clothes, music, soap!
One last suggest: if you get your hands on information that is proven and that you can get your wits around, push yourself to the limit APPLYING that information and don’t worry about the next new eBook or teleseminar that’s being promoted to you. Sometimes you just need to put the rest on hold while you do your darndest to apply what you already know.
One of the main reasons why new affiliate marketers don’t succeed is because they chase after golden eggs. Most of the “strategies” being taught will produce profits given the right niche, but it requires dedication and perseverance. You don’t get that with minimal effort over the course of 30 days, at which point most people lose interest and move on to chase the next golden egg.
It’s also important to realize that affiliate marketing involves selling… or more specifically… pre-selling.
Selling is a skill that has to be learned. Some people are more naturally talented at selling than others, but just about anyone can become proficient at selling if they work at it. Yet too many people start affiliate marketing and don’t bother learning the skill.
You don’t make a living selling a product just because you “show up” enough times, or go on and on about how great the product is. The best sales person makes the customer feel at ease, and rarely comes across as being pushy or strong. The same principals that work for selling offline also work online.
Exactly, I have been amazed recently at all the blogs with Alexa under 100K that have just stopped posting. The ONLY way to succeed is to not give up.
Great article Yaro!
I too have been wondering if all these internet marketing schemes are scams or get rich quick programs.
Here’s my take on it:
We are at the point in Web 2.0 where Web 1.0 was in the mid 90’s. There were so many websites with no hope of ever making money starting up. Within a few years, those sites are gone and the victorious few have emerged like Ebay, Amazon, Yahoo, Google, etc.
In Web 2.0, the social networking sites will get weeded out also. Bloggers will start to drop off and a few authoritative and highly trafficked blogs will remain and only a few ‘make money online’ sites will remain.
The one thing that I despise about the internet marketing industry is that it seems incestuous to me. They all promote each others’ product to their friend’s mailing lists. Every week there’s a ‘next big thing’. Think about it, if so-and-so’s product or scheme is so great, how come they’re promoting something else the following week? Imagine a spokerperson for Nike switching to Adidas’ shoes the following week. He would lose credibility. Stick to one thing and promote the heck out of it.
Mini-sites are annoying as hell. In fact, I hit the back button immediately when I see a mini-site. The web is getting saturated with these and they’ve become like the banner ads of the past. The general audience will start to realize what mini-sites are and become blind to them.
I hope the internet marketing world gets cleaned up quick. But i’m afraid this will take a couple more years if not more.
Jessel
http://vertigoeffect.com
This is a killer post. I like the idea that people are making money from shovel and picks but others can also make money. I recently had a reader on my blog who left a comment saying that the ability to make money online was a scam and that the only people making money were the people teaching people how to make money online (the people selling the picks and shovels). I disagreed with his statement and wrote my reply at http://www.smarterwealth.net/2008/09/is-making-money-online-a-scam/
Thanks for this post. It was rad
Great post. Very eye opening, and I really like the way you start off by comparing to something physical that everyone knows about (the gold rush).
Oh my god, Yaro, I am not able to read the entire post. This is a fantastic post, but can you split such posts into 2.
Hey Yaro,
This is a great post. Internet marketing is NOT like the gold rush because the gold rush was based mostly on luck. Internet marketing, on the other hand, is based mostly on persistence, hard work, and skill (although luck doesn’t hurt either).
Although you state that there is abundant wealth to go around, attention is a limited resource especially for content-heavy sites like blogs. Sure hard work pays off, but in the end, you still have to be unique and provide value to users.
I guess the wisdom would be to sell the picks and shovels and dig for gold at the same time. Which is really what the funded proposal is all about. Seeling eBooks and courses to generate income and then funnel the leads into your backend MLM scheme or whatever.
I came online in 1995 and thought it was a farce. I was online before most successful internet marketers you see around today. And I quit online marketing until 2002 when again I tried it and walked away from it thinking again it was all crap.
In the time that I fluffed around people have come online and made fortunes and I missed out because I had a bad attitude. I am now starting again for my third time and it’s damn hard work. However I will say this…
My main thought back then was that I had missed the boat and that all the opportunities had come and gone. This was before YouTube, MySpace and other Web 2.0 technologies. How wrong I was. And how wrong you are if you think the internet has reached it’s maximum potential and that all opportunities are gone.
I agree the internet is still in it’s infancy. And I have watched it change from the sidelines since 1995. Heck I was on the net before Mike Dillard and guys like Frank Kern and Mike Fillsaime.
Don’t miss the boat because of bad attitude. My goal now is to position myself for the next wave (and there will be a next wave) to be in the right position to ride the elevator up. You are doing yourself a huge disservice by thinking that the pyramid has been built already and all opportunities have come and gone.
Now is the time to position yourself for what is coming in the future. That is what I should have been doing back in 1995 and 2002.
Good Post.
As I was reading early in the post I had the pangs of pessimism creep in, but I was glad there was some realistic hope at the end.
Is the present crop of 2rd/3rd Gen internet marketers like the old saying, “What you don’t do, you teach”, and the rest puts up with the BS?
Cheers…Ty
A great analogy, comparing gold rush with internet marketing. Possibly, also could have used music shops selling instruments to young and hopeful musicians. Apparently, after the Beatles toured USA in the 1960’s, music stores sold a lot of guitars that year.
I always like to ask the question - what is the “unmet need” in your industry?
From my most unpopular and poorly written post - “The Unmet Need”
“If American billionaire H. Ross Perot ever said anything I will remember then it’s his blindingly simple but effective business advice. It went something like this.
1. Get into an industry and get to know everything about that industry.
2. Discover the unmet needs of the customers in that industry.
3. Build your business around that unmet need.
That’s it.”
Thank you for this article! I especially appreciate how you distinguish the internet from a “pyramid”.
One of the things that I think is especially appealing about internet business is that you can easily start part-time with little investment. This gives people the opportunity to build up their business. Certainly this means build up their income and money, but it also means build up their skills, their network, and the quality of their work. In fact, running a part-time internet business can be a powerful personal development plan!
For myself, writing my blog forces me to do the things that I know I should be doing (because I’m teaching others to do them!), to become a better writer, to learn from others in the industry, and to develop new skills. It has been a wonderful process. I personally do not have the goal of leaving my job. I love my job. I would like to increase my income through my blog, but I know that will come with time, if I truly do get better and better at what I do.
Thanks again.
Very thought-provoking - I can relate to a lot of what you’re saying. I’m still fairly new to this whole thing, but I’m kind of glad there’s some sort of barrier to entry (many will try, but not everyone will succeed) - it still leaves room for hard work to be rewarded.
Great Post Yaro.
People have to realise when you are buying these so call secrets “Make Money Now” you in fact are paying for their ideas, experiences and their techniques they used to achieve their goal.
You are not paying for a get rich scheme. You need to take the idea and manipulate their idea into your own. If you really think you can copy someone else’s technique, then you heading into troubled waters. You need to experiment, refine and try again.
Norm
Some very good points well made.
I think we all have a responsibility when we are selling products online that we don’t end up selling ‘hope to the hopeless’.
When u put it like u did at the start, about those who made money being the ones selling items to those wanting to join the rush, it really got me thinking - u are dead on correct
But yeah, I guess that is the beauty of affiliate marketing and internet marketing
Good article. For getting sucess in internet marketing field we need hard work it is just not a automated process. We have do everything according business strategies. You described it in very easy way. Thank you……
Thanks for this post. I was beginning to wonder what it takes to establish myself in internet marketing and after reading your post + Blog Profits Blueprint, I can see where I was going wrong.
Thanks again
Actually in the Australian gold rush there was good money to be made - the government sold large claims - to reduce the number - which meant it was possible to make a better living than most people had.
I think the online world is still expanding and so is a growing market. If you can provide excellent value then I think you should be able to make a good income. I’m pretty poor at marketing, and am trying to start something new, so it’s a long and slow process for me. I’m about to launch my first product, so I’m about to find out what’s possible.
Thank you for the long post Yaro. It was not only long but Great, but as you know net fellows like you and me are lazy while surfing so, at least please emphasize the main points, so we don’t have to read it whole.
Eventually what happened to the Mom and Pop stores, and the corner grocer in the real world will happen on the net. In the meanwhile, for those interested, it offers a short to medium term opportunity.
What is more interesting are two other developments.
1. Most Internet entrepreneurs wanted to make money on line to get out of the rat race and be self employed. Now they are working harder than before and have got on the tiger’s back unable to get off!
2. The casualty rate of start ups is just about the same for Internet businesses as it is in the real world.
Like anything else in life, you can not get away from such truths.
I think that staying away from the “Making Money Online” niche is a smart move for me … but I am interested in the concept of sharing what I know with small business owners and professionals who want to begin marketing their products and services online.
Yaro,
Excellent post! As a member of your Blog Mastermind Class for about six weeks I can say emphatically that the reason that people fail is truly that they don’t actually follow the class. You have given us detailed instructions and actions for each lesson yet I can tell by looking at the blogs of fellow classmates that they are not following those instructions. I think that people love to sign up for classes or buy CD courses and believe that if they just read or listen to the material success will happen. They never realize that they need to put forth effort, and a great deal of it to be a success.
I have told myself that if I apply everything that I learn in BMM over the course of the next 12 months that I should see results. I don’t expect to work from home overnight, or even within a year! I do expect to see a consistent, small growth over time and that is exactly what is happening so I am extremely pleased.
I hope people who read this post catch the key ingredient to success as themselves.
Thank you!
Hi
I’m new here, I just found this site. I never heard of Yaro Starak until today.
I see lots of people have avatars. I’ve never seen avatars in a blogs comment section, that’s kinda different. Of course I’ve seen them in discussion forums. That tells me that the people here who have avatars registered as you would in any discussion forum on the Internet. The thing is I don’t see a registration link anywhere on this site. Avatars are nice…
I’m not sure if I’ll post again. Maybe I’ll never come back to this site. Then again maybe I’ll become a regular who visits this site on a daily basis and contributes a post every so often. If I do, I’d like to aquire an avatar.
Aside from the avatar matter, since I’m a person who is very interested in trying to earn a living by using the Internet, I would like to add that since you can’t verify a web masters credibility, any web masters credibility, you have to wonder if the how-to make money programs they’re selling will work for someone who’s starting out from ground zero.
I see Mr. Starak offers a thirty day money back guarantee on his $497 ‘Blog Mastermind’ money making system. When I first discovered that I said to myself, ‘Wow, that’s great…so far, so good.’ Money back guarantees are a sure sign that the owner of a how-to make money program is pretty darn confident about his tutorial. A money back guarantee provides the buyer with a strong sense of faith and fairness, which is what any honest buyer can, or should, appreciate.
Not only that, but any merchant who offers a money back guarantee is a merchant who should be held in high regard. I’ve done a lot of shopping in my time, including purchases made on the Internet. A tip of the cap and a sincere ‘thanks for being a stand-up, fair minded businessman’ comment should be given to any person or company who offers a moneyback guarantee, whether they are an Internet merchant or a real world merchant.
And then I got to thinking: the thing is, and correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think a person should, or could, expect to make an extra $500 a month a short thirty days after launching their first blog. I’m not even sure that they would have the right to expect to make a consistent $250 a month thirty days after launching their first blog. Six to twelve months later, yes, perhaps. But in a short thirty days? That might all fall under the ‘if it’s too good to be true then it probrably isn’t’ category.
From what I’ve gleaned over time, it might take a new blogger six months to recover the $497, the cost of Mr. Starak’s system. If I’m wrong about any of the points I made, please share your comment.
And thanks for your time.
It is not like the gold rush IMO only because they is so much money to be made from Internet Marketing and I highly doubt the money will ever dry up.
And yes, don’t study what people say, study what they are actually doing.
Some good points Yaro.
Follow through is like an aeroplane taxing down the runway. You can buy permission to take off, fairly cheaply. But it’s up to you to generate enough power to lift off. That’s a consistent, constant, and never ending focus to get off the ground. If you let up before you get airbourne, you’ll crash and burn.
With the internet, there are no excuses. It’s all about technical know how with a touch of creativity. You can learn anything you want, without paying a dime. All you need is a appetite, patience and determination.
It is a food chain, except the little fishes have become smarter. It’s no longer about your SIZE, but more about how SMART you are. Think Poker strategy. Know you opponents hands, understand the system, play to survive, aim to win…
A.
Hi Yaro, I really enjoy your analogies. They make things so much more interesting. I have also subscribed to your newsletter on blogging tips. I have not got your ebook though. Your report on ‘The Blog Profits
Blueprint’, could you please send that to me?
Has the blueprint arrived yet? If you are on my newsletter, then the first email you receive after joining has a link to download the blueprint.
If not, just stick your name and email into the newsletter sign-up at the top right of this page you are on now.
The miners could be successful, the tool sellers could be successful, yet the most successful story will come from a miner turned tool seller. Just like you Yaro. Great post!
Superb Post Yaro
I am an example of “catching the wave” through good positioning - so I can relate totally to the article…
To find out just how I caught the wave in the nick of time - click my link above.
Thanks for sharing your knowledge and opinion Yaro.
This is a very insightful article. I’ve felt similar things for some time, that there are a lot of dreamers on the web, who believe that they can strike it rich through internet marketing, and mistakenly believe it is some easy and unobstructed path to riches. Personally, I think the learning curve is quite high to truly become an expert in any particular niche of internet marketing, and unless you are willing to pay the price, your chances are quite slim.
Most people have a better chance of making a good living by starting a small business and selling a physical product or service that improves people’s physical lives. One can and should augment whatever they do with an online presence, but it is only part of the equation. There are so few people who exemplify pride in the work of their hands or the service that they perform. In order to succeed consistently, there has to be a sense of excellence and craft.
This blog post typifies craft and excellence.
So much of the internet is littered with subpar or even junk content. Don’t get me wrong, I think there is a place for good SEO, and other internet marketing techniques, but so many only do a fraction of what is necessary and then they quit, before they truly master something.
More and more people buy desktop and laptop computers everyday. So the market gets bigger. We have a long way before it becomes like the gold rush.
your posts are always mind blowing. I normally don’t like long posts but yours are different, it keeps me reading till the very end.
It’s very true about China, where I come from, shopping online has a huge potential, Alibaba is doing great with taobao.com, lots of online sellers and buyers, but different from platforms, the number of individual online shops that are doing well is very small. there sure is a very big market potential and I’m sure if getting in early, you’ll be among the first gold miners.
Hi Yaro,
What I don’t like about some Internet Marketers that are trying to sell their products and services is they try to sell an overwhelming amount, where they are doing just the opposite of providing value and, in my opinion, are devaluing their offer.
I also thought about the Web as the Wild West, the Internet Rush, because their is gold mines to be dug and I agree with your viewpoint about Internet Marketing.
Thank you for an insightful post.
Yours sincerely,
Rick Resch
I have always believed that you can get money from the Internet if you study the online practices and of course look hard enough. You can earn money on the web and sadly I do not fall for the product marketing and selling scheme to which many have dedicated their site.
It is obvious that they are aiming for a sale. But if all people were ignorant then perhaps they would be millionaires by now. The fact of the matter is that people are turning to the web for one thing – money. There is money on the web; YES. But as to how you go about it would depend. You still have to work for it since it is not something where you can simply sit back and let money come easily into your pockets.
And as far as Internet Marketing compared to a pyramiding scheme, well on a note, perhaps yes. But then again you can easily assail that, especially when you see a site focusing a lot on building that service and egging you to buy a certain product via certain link.
Yaro,
I really admire this post and I like your writing.
I believe what we are seeing now is the commencement of a new age of IM. The days of the individual prospector and beginning to fade. What will replace the individual will be the mining company (ie. Stompernet). A co-op of successful prospectors that come together and share their knowledge under one company in order to dominate the entire landscape.
The individual cannot compete with the company. If you look at the latest Stompernet launch and what they are giving away for so little (including all the bonuses), no individual marketer can compete with that.
This is the equivalent to me setting up a corner store and then having Wal-Mart build right next door. They just look at what I’m selling and give it away for free all in one aisle. They still have 22 other aisles of products for sale. Everything they give away is just written off and absorbed into their costs. In time there will be other “Stompernets” that form and will offer equally great deals, but this will eventually sound the death knell for the individual.
Yes, there will be money to make online in the future but you will have to get wise and network with other people and form a “mining company” in order to do this.
p.s.
love to meet you sometime.
I’m a brissy boy too
Yaro,
A long but powerful post. I have heard people ranting that they can’t make money online and then they quit and ’stop dreaming’ - WHILE telling others to stop trying to be rich online.
IMO, this is the biggest reason why there are people staying at the top of the food chain for a long time - because ‘lazy and non-resilient’ people keep evangelising that make money online is only for the big guys (i.e. pro bloggers).
Stop ranting, keep learning and keep doing what’s best, because Internet business is here to stay!
Cheers
Excellent post. I have read several today all inspiring diligence. Persistence will payoff. The Internet is an incredible tool for business, your own or getting involved in other networking projects. Thanks for the insight.
Tyrone said- “The individual cannot compete with the company” Rubbish.
The individual has the means to do things a company never can, never will or will be too slow to react too.
An individual must his ability to make decisions quickly and stay ahead.
There is lots of money to be made online, but there are more excuses as to why it can’t be done than there is money!
So if your heart is not in it, you can forget about it now.
Wow, that was an excellent post Yaro. It’s been a while since I’ve read one with such substance. I’ll agree completely with you on many points. Internet Marketing really isn’t for people who don’t possess the sheer passion, determination and persistence to make it happen.
There are way to many false dreams sold online. It’s great to see you are being completely honest about things with your marketing. It’s a trait that I hope continues to catch on with more marketers. Enough…of the crap.. hope sellers already!
Cheers
Davin
Hi Yaro,
Great post mate.
First I wanted to make the comment that the reason a lot of people out there are disillusioned with Internet Marketing, is simply because the start-up costs are so low.
There are disillusioned people in every market place. There are people who have tried franchises and failed horribly. But there are fewer of these people for two main reasons:
1. Not many people can afford to buy a franchise, so the amount that fail is proportionally small.
2. If you spend $50,000+ to buy a franchise you tend to stick with it and push a lot harder.
I can speak with experience because I have “played” with Internet businesses since 2003. Because I didn’t spend much on it, and I had an income from elsewhere I did not have the motivation to keep pushing it.
The second thing that really grabs me about your post is the idea that Internet Marketing is a good niche. I have always steered away from it, because of the competition and because I felt so many others knew more than me. I never really thought of it in depth as you have here in your post.
-I am not about to jump into the Internet Marketing space, but thank you for giving me a new perspective on it.
Cheers,
Chris
Hello Yaro,
Great post. My feeling is that in order to make it in the Internet Marketing field you need to educate yourself and then apply what you learn. Many people fail because they realize that making money online is hard work and indeed a real business that requires planning and persistance.
There no such thing as a magic bullet.
i like the analysis about the gold rush and the comparison to the internet moneymaking rush. i think you might be able to add one or two extra groups to the gold rush stakeholders - people who transported the goods (Wells Fargo and shipping companies taking bullion away from the West Coast) and people who in later years sold the history of the gold rush. the analog in the web world might be companies that sell hosting/web design and people who write books on the failure of web marketing.
I agree that there is a growing market for Internet Marketing solutions, however there’s just so much garbage out there and I’m sure many people try and go home disappointed. Even some so-called experts are become so commercialized and are simply endorsing products without really thinking whether it helps their prospective customer or not.
Yaro, as usual you hit the nail on the head. There are still droves of persons who can’t wait to carve out their niche online. Taking action and overcoming your own inertia are the biggest obstacles. At least they are mine. Thanks for the inspiration to keep going.
Wow! Great article. Just found your site through Tecnorati and subscribed to your feed. Hope to read more of your insight in the future. Cheers!
Does everything you touch turn to gold Yaro?
What is your secret?
Once again you provide some great insight Yaro! Though the similarities are there, I still think the potential for Internet income is huge. Not get rich quick schemes and the such, but honest and real opportunities to build a business online is there.
There is nothing wrong with providing basic information to the newcomers, if you know it, teach it! Everyone doesn’t have to be the guru/expert/go to guy to make a living online. It’s a proven fact, if you’ve been doing any type of marketing or blogging online for any amount of time, you know something that folks just starting don’t, and you have the opportunity to help them.
Sure, they can do like you and go out and learn it themselves, but if you can save folks form making the same mistakes, or wasting time, then that is a great service I think.
thanks for the post Yaro
I agree - I had never thought of internet marketing in this way before
But when u put it this way, it really seems like a lot of hype and lots of big guys cashing in on the hype - and the hype isn’t dying down
It still amazes me that people buy stuff on how to make money online when u can find it all on forums and stuff
You’re right about the people of China going online, but in most cases Westerners can’t sell to them as the Westerners can’t speak Chinese and only few Chinese can speak serious English. But maybe India is a good destination as English is a major language there.
There is no such thing as a quick buck, but the sales talk on the web promise it. Never before have people been able to access the potential of so many customers as they have during the Internet Age.
I do believe that there is a lot of money to be made on the Internet but it must be treated as a business and business in general take time, hard work etc to achieve.
Great post, enjoyed the read will be checking our your other posts, Goran
Yaro, as per usual you have made some interesting points. The future of internet marketing is near impossible to predict, but in my opinion with the rise of technology and the internet it will definitely continue to run into the foreseeable future.
‘Fools’ in the business? Well as in every business there are always some that will fail or never make it (society reflects this), but if you’re willing to put in the time and research eventually you will triumph in the business.
Keep up your interesting posts; I enjoy reading them.
Another great post- and the simile with fools gold is interesting. Blind leading the blind- reminds me of college professors who teach entrepreneurship and write thesis and books on the topic but have ever actually started a business themselves. In every industry- in order to succeed, one must really have the passion and determination - to keep learning and growing even in the face of initial failures. I see a lot of opportunities in the internet market- and yes, it will take hard work and good business sense to succeed. But at least, the capital is much lesser than brick and mortar business.
Sometimes I just want to give up making money online, but this post inspired me. thx yaro!
Heh heh.. I don’t see the Internet being anything like the gold rush.. first of all, gold was a limited commodity, with finite quanities.. The Internet is, inno way, limited!! It’s another world in which we all do business… Internet marketing courses and products are just like offline marketing courses and products and have the same practicality of application
I am new to blogging too. Will I make money? I really don’t know.
What matters to me at this point is that I contribute something valuable to the readers. It will simply be a shame and beneath me to contribute trash. If I make money, then I must be contributing something valuable. If not, then I need to change my behavior.
What really encouraged me to get on with this was the remark from a participant in one blogging seminar I attended. He said, “The blogosphere is the new real estate, only that the ‘land’ is not limited.”
It didn’t take me long to realize what he meant. I tried real estate, and value of the real estate depends on traffic (same as in the blogosphere).
When a mall tycoon built a gargantuan mall in a very strange location in the city, he simply surprised everybody (I guess this is ths situation everyone is in on the first day, week or month in one’s website).
Well, that was until he made the location a destination for everybody…a large cathedral on the side, beautiful landscape, a big wide welcoming facade seen from afar, an arrangement with the city to route the buses to that area, and so on, an so forth.
I am referring to the SM Mall of Asia in Metro Manila.
What magnet attracted people to visit this far flung mall in a city that is already full of malls at almost every corner? I think the magnet consisted of (1) value and (2) options.
I think that’s what we do here in blogosphere.
There’s one more thing about Henry Sy, the owner of the mall. He’s passionate about what he does. He’s more comfortable planning out malls than speaking in front of a few people.
And, just like any other business, the ones who make it are those who persist and innovate. Not all people persist. Not all people innovate. Much less people persist AND innovate.
Hi Marvin,
I like value and options. I have the feeling that this is one of those seemingly simple statements that conceals a wealth of insight.
You’ve certainly got me thinking. Thanks.
I like the analogy about the gold rush. It’s true that most of the sustainable wealth was created by selling shovels, picks and essentials to the goldminers. I find the pyschology of internet marketing is very much like that of the goldrush era. I wrote an interesting article about what motivates people to buy. You can read the article here http://www.goldminermarketing.com/greedorfear.htm
It’s worth noting that people are motivated by the same thing today as they were in 1848. People are motivated to buy because they are afraid they will lose something or because they feel they really must have it. The Apple Iphone is a classic example. How many people were willing to pay $600 for an Iphone because they just HAD to have it?