How I made some money online

First of all, it's important to know that there is no easy way to make money. That's the truth. The only people that are making easy money are the "infomercial" people who are collecting your cash to send you a set of books/cd's and audio tapes which are designed to provide you with common sense advice sprinkled with some technical advice. In short, I believe that the information you glean from those books/cd's and audio tapes would be the equivalent to what you would get from a 5 minute conversation with a well informed professional.

Here's my suggestion to you... next time you see a particularly compelling infomercial that seems to good to be true, but really engages your imagination, get out a pen and paper and write down the key words... the things that this infomercial says they are going to provide you with... they always use catch phrases and terms for the things they say you will need to succeed... well, write them down. AND write down the name of the program.

First, go to Google. Check out the program and you will probably find that there are a lot of "scam" posts. This will reinforce your will power to not get sucked in by the compelling call to action that is always something like -"If you order now, we will throw in our latest book which is a $19.00 value" or... "30 day money back guarantee".

Now, armed with your catch phrases, key terms and buzz words... You can check out the internet and learn what they really mean. I can't tell you how many times I have searched and searched for something online and was unsuccessful until I found what the words the "industry" was using... then the doors opened up!

This is how I discovered "affiliates" and "partner programs" and adsense and more. Use the infomercials to help understand what you need to know, and them the internet to teach you about it.

First, in order to make money online you need to have a web presence. That does not necessarily mean you need a website. My top FREE suggestions for a web presence are Hubpages, Facebook Pages and Wordpress.com free blog or if your selling products eBay. (important note: a blog is no longer simply a personal journal or "weblog" as it started out. Many if not most wordpress blogs are now fully functional websites).

Secondly, (and this is what all the infomercials are about) you need to know what you are going to "sell" and how that will drive traffic to your site. This is the most difficult part of making money online. I am a firm believer of "if you write it, they will come". AND I have also come to realize that... I have absolutely no idea what other people are thinking! :0)
Here are my successes and failures...

Ebay Book Store: moderately successful.. alot of physical work - shopping for popular books at local thrift stores and library sales, then listing them on ebay, then packing them up when they are sold. I say moderately successful because although I made money, it didn't compensate for my time. I will say this... I LOVE Books... and if I were single without children this would be a great hobby that would pay for itself. You can sell books on ebay, alibris and amazon.

Handmade Jewelry: This is a very FULL market and competitive, and I just am not a "sales person" At craft fairs my jewelry sold very well, but it wasn't worth sitting for 8 hours at the table after spending however much time I spent making the jewelry. Very little sold from my website or Amazon. You can sell jewelry on ebay, amazon and etsy. (of course your own website)

Tarot Card Reading: I surprised myself by actually being quite good, and I sold readings online via personal emails... but well, I didn't like doing it. I didn't "believe" the way some people really "believe" and even though time and time again my clients told me how true the reading was, I felt like a fake... you know? You can sell readings on your own website and ebay.

Website Design: This really works for me. I enjoy this, I'm good at this, I make money at this. You can read my blog at http://easybuildawebsite.com and if you are looking for hosting or domain registration http://hosting.easybuildawebsite.com --I know, I know... but how could I possibly NOT plug my business? :0) (I'm actually a GoDaddy reseller.. and my prices are actually better then godaddy, but you get the same support)

Affiliate Marketing - This is an interesting area for online income... for years I didn't make anything but a couple of pennies with online affiliate marketing then suddenly I built a couple of websites (I have about 30 websites right now) and the affiliate money started coming in... OF COURSE, everyone will tell you the key is the niche market. (Niche is a specialized market and pronounced like NITCH) let me restate... FOR YEARS, I made nothing. I posted my google adwords, I subscribed to commission junction and posted links to products and advertisers... nothing. Then it all changed.

You want to know what changed? I tapped into a seasonal market at just the right time with just the right product and for 30 days... I made money. I can't retire on what I made, but it renewed my efforts to find that ..."thing" that people want.

Here's how I did it.

First. I have websites. I host my own wordpress websites but you can start out free with wordpress.com

Second. I signed up for Commission Junction

Third. I thought about things I needed to buy and looked for companies that sold those things on commission junction... and applied to be a partner.

Fourth. Once my application was approved, I started posting the products on my website. Commission Junction provides everything you need to post the product on your website.

Fifth. I created a facebook page and asked my friends to like it... and started updating my facebook page with each post

and viola'

My original niche... (not my original because I'd been trying to make money as an affiliate for YEARS!) but the one that worked... should I tell you? I discovered it when I was shopping for my kids. I was online (should I tell you?) for Halloween Costumes... when I noticed ALL OF THE WAY AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE... the words "affiliate" and I thought... Hey wait a minute.. this company offers an affiliate program... I might as well take advantage of that. I quickly created a Halloween Costume Site (it was so rudimentary that I'm not even going to tell you site.. I'm in the process of revamping it for next season)

Turns out Halloween Costumes pay a fairly high commission, so relatively few people made purchases through my site and I got paid an average of 10% per sale. It was nice and like I said it has helped me to renew my efforts with affiliate marketing.

Now... I'm sure you're all going to go rushing out to get your Halloween costume website up and running for next October but here's my point. That worked for me, because of my facebook friends, and because I'm such a geek that I found tools to automatically post the 100's of costumes as content to my website and lots of other reasons... Maybe your facebook friends would be more interested in Fishing lures... or Lionel Trains... or Legos... My point is... Start with something you enjoy.

Start with something that you are enthusastic about. Something timely, something seasonal... and then let everyone that you know... Create a public Facebook Page, or a Google Plus page.

The thing I like the most about Affiliate Marketing is that I'm not actually selling the product. I'm not packing anything up... shipping anything out... I'm just letting people know that the products are there... and if they want them they can have them.

The other thing I learned is... If it's popular, it's popular for a reason. Now the "market" may be saturated with "get rich quick schemes" and only certain types of people are going to be lured into making that kind of purchase (... cough... cough... ok, I may have purchased one or two in my life... which only helps to illustrate I know what I'm talking about...)

The key to finding a niche is finding that thing that people ... ALL PEOPLE... are probably going to want to buy. Start with the basics... Food, Clothing, Shelter and work out from there.

Food... what about couponing. You can register as an affiliate and start your own coupon site here: MySavings. This company provides you will all the tools you need to start your own coupon website.

Clothing... there are soooo many affiliate opportunities for clothing through commission junction it's ridiculous. If you have kids and you know of a specific item that is popular in the area... this is a great place to start.

Shelter... there are affiliate opportunities for vacations, home sales or rentals all through commission junction and their registered partners.

Again, let me restate. My successful book selling business and tarot card reading were great businesses, but I feel like if I'm going to succeed I need to enjoy what I'm doing. Both became a different kind of stress for me. Affiliate Marketing with specific niches really works for me because I don't mind spending several hours on the computer updating sites, reviewing my visitor statistics as it relates to the specific posts on that day.

It's not easy... but I enjoy this kind of work.

I hope this helped! Have a great new year!