Are You Earning What You're Worth?

How much time are you spending trying to earn online?

Are your online activities bringing in the MINIMUM that you have expected them to?

If you think you're spending too much time trying to earn online without seeing results or you've seen some results but these aren't what you expected - and your expectations were really reasonable...

Maybe it's time to review your Primary program.

Here's a major mistake that most beginners make online when they are first attempting to build up an online income. I'll use a true example that just happened recently with a friend of mine.

A peer of mine asked me out for coffee recently and wanted to know what I was doing successfully online to earn money. My peer noticed, from some forum posts that I was earning a little money - FINALLY - and wondered if I was 'telling tales.'

I told her the truth - that I am earning modest amounts - but it has only been happening in the past 6mo or so - since I evaluated and selected a better PRIMARY PROGRAM than I started out with almost 3 years ago. I mentioned that I have also DROPPED some 'tiny' programs that were TIME-WASTERS!

"What do you mean by Primary program?" I was asked, so I told her 'My basic money earning program.'

"Oh I have a bunch of those," my friend said, "I am earning little pennies from a bunch of primary programs and am finding that all this work is just NOT WORTH IT!"

Whoops!

My friend wasn't REALLY aware of what 'Primary Program' means. Her idea of 'primary' program was PLURAL and was just like some of the programs that I recently dropped like hot potatoes! She thought that 'Primary' had something to do with 'paying' programs - almost anything that isn't a 'scam.'

Anyhow - I am still in the process of explaining to her that a Primary program is a non-scam, legitimate money earning program that is of HIGH QUALITY and that can be promoted through other means.

GDI (Though I am not involved with this one) is a Primary program that TONS of people are successfully earning money with. It is a Primary program that people 'focus' on building up. The other 'programs' that people use to combine with GDI and make their GDI business successful are the 'tiny' programs like traffic exchanges, newsletters, autoresponder follow-ups, various emailing (non-spam!) avenues and click programs.

Watkins (not involved in this company either, but I wish I was) is a Primary program that many people are successfully earning money with - in much the same way as GDI members are earning money.

Shaklee, Amway, Pay It Forward For Profits, Success University, and many others are legitimate Primary Programs.

With Shaklee, vitamins and health products are the products of focus. With Amway, a great variety of foods, health items, vitamins, cleaning products and household items are the cold, hard products that are worth promoting. With Pay It Forward, the Marketing program and training items are the products of focus, same with Success University.

The other 'tiny' programs aren't the main focus that brings in the money, when you are involved in Internet Marketing. Getting all your customers to your Primary program or to use the goods available at your primary program - this is what business is all about. You can gain some earnings from the 'tiny' programs you use, too, but what you are really concerned with is allowing your clients to gain access to Shaklee vitamins, Amway dish soap, PIF4P's 'Internet Marketing' lessons, Success University's 'Internet Business' training.

You see - what my friend believed about earning money online is that being involved in a hundred 'tiny' programs would earn her a lot of money if she just kept clicking regularly - and that people would 'catch on' and start signing up as her referrals and start making her life and work easier somewhere down the line.

This doesn't work - rather - this CAN WORK, but it would involve a person designing their OWN Primary program (which many Primary programs are about) which acts as a super downline builder.

It is much easier to utilize a 'cold, hard product' program that is already in existence and bring your potential referrals, clients to that, as your Primary program.

Although the 'design your own Primary program' is not a bad idea, unless you're a very experienced marketer already, this will be somewhat complicated and time-consuming for you to accomplish.

The second idea is much more reliable for someone who has less experience, someone like my friend. Part of the reason is that certain programs already have an excellent REPUTATION, and 'product' that people can use right away. Whether products are in the form of 'software,' 'lessons,' 'eBooks,' 'electronic gadgets,' 'cell phone accessories,' 'downloadable music,' or whatever, they are already good quality and SET UP for access!

I'll just leave you to think about these things. Figure out whether you're spending too much time making program owners (PTR, PTC, TE owners, perhaps) too much money and mistaking their program for a PRIMARY program - when really - you should be utilizing the 'tiny' programs to lead people to other hardcopy items, solid goods, or reputable services.

Here's The Niche Empire Generator

Everyone is talking about Niche this and Niche that.

Well 'Niche' is a specialized category, so don't get confused by Internet Marketing lingo that makes you think that you can't figure out what's going on.

A Niche is simply a particular category of products, services, of information that you're interested in - that you know a lot about - and that you'd like to promote online.

"Finding Your Niche" isn't rocket science, by any means. It simply means finding your area of interest, providing that it lines up with your area of knowledge, skill, or whatever tasks you like to do - and turning that interest Niche into your 'Online Business.'

I have a ton of interests but not all my skills line up with my interests, so some 'Niches' are not a good area for me to get into.

For instance - I love games - video games - but I have a lot of studying to do and I don't play video games as much as I would like to. Therefore, I wouldn't try to open up a blog or website and tailor it to providing video games, video game information or anything. I wouldn't do well in the Video Gaming Niche at all. I just like to play Starcraft once in a while, check out some strategy forums for tips and really - Starcraft has a HUGE following but it isn't the newest game around.

You can see why I would have a terrible and unsuccessful time if I tried to jump out online and become a Video Game Marketer and promote these. I'm not really even up to date with video gaming sheesh!

I don't know why so many people constantly use the term 'Niche Market' because all Marketing uses Niches! Sometimes a 'Niche' is overpopulated and it's hard to sell products in that Niche because everyone and their aunt is selling the same products in the same market!

I don't know why there are so many products out there that say "Learn Niche Marketing" in particular and that treat 'Niche Marketing' as some special new-fangled kind of Marketing. A lot of scammers make money this way, promoting 'Niche Programs' like they're something that you can't get and that belong only to the word 'Niche' or something.

If you heard somebody saying that they wanted to sell you a new kind of pet, a new breed of cat - The BLUE FELIX CAT or something, that might be something to look into - if it really were a new and different breed from the others. But selling 'Niche' as something completely different from most marketing online - or inherently 'special' in internet marketing - is kind of like bringing your new BLUE FELIX CAT home, only to find out that it is a regular Tabby with the hair dyed BLUE!

Don't get me wrong - there is a special category of marketing called 'Niche Marketing' too. It took me about a year of checkin' this out - but it seems to me, after reading constantly about 'Niche' information - that someone doing targetted 'Niche Marketing' is simply someone who attacks a number of 'niches' at once. There is a plan of attack in doing this - but it's basically a 'tactic' of Marketing, not a wholly different thing than Marketing. I think that this term is generally overused and probably gained popularity due to the internet - because much that happens in the world of internet marketing is different than offline marketing where you're dealing with 'Brick and Mortar' issues like storage space, business space rental, hardcopy everything and physical products.

Anyhow - if you're already into 'Niche Marketing' (and you probably are, if you're into marketing at all), here's a really cool program - with a bunch of information at the members site, too. This program has SO MANY PROMOTIONAL tools in the individual members area - it's not even funny!

Hence - I hope you'll seriously look into this:

Here's How to Build An Empire Of Highly Profitable Niche Sites On AUTOPILOT!

Start Your Online Business Today

It's not secret to those who know me - that my favorite program for MONTHS is the Resell Rights For Newbies program by Liz Tomey and John Hostler.

Resell Rights For Newbies

I mean - even if you find that 'Resell Rights' aren't for you - the free videos that Liz and John have made available are second-to-none! The videos walk the viewer through every stage of what it takes to set up a simple online Reseller business. You can change the 'reseller' part anytime you want and do some other 'niche' or area of business online.

The plain truth of the matter is:

In order to become really successful with a sustainable business and online earning, you'll need a website.

Luckily, Liz and John's videos show you how to deal with getting a website set up - right from selecting your web domain name and gaining a web hosting account - right on up to how to upload files to your new website, make pages where people can download from you and - best of all - how to make sure you get PAID automatically from the download page!

This program is something that you shouldn't pass up! It's free for the time being, but I'm not sure how long Liz and John are planning on allowing all of this advanced information to be had for free!

Resell Rights For Newbies by Liz Tomey and John Hostler

The Battle Against Spam

Fighting Spam
How prevalent is Spam? According to Scott McAdams, OMA(Ontario Medical Association) Public Affairs and Communications Department (www.oma.org):

"Studies show unsolicited or 'junk' e-mail, known as spam, accounts for roughly half of all e-mail messages received. Although once regarded as little more than a nuisance, the prevalence of spam has increased to the point where many users have begun to express a general lack of confidence in the effectiveness of e-mail transmissions, and increased concern over the spread of computer viruses via unsolicited messages."

(what was meant above is.........It's ALL OVER THE PLACE, Affecting nearly everyone.)

In December of 2003, in the U.S.A., President Bush signed the "Can Spam" bill. This was the first national standard developed surrounding the issue of 'bulk, unsolicited commercial e-mail'. Approved by 97 to 0, in a vote within the Senate, this bill prohibits senders of unsolicited commercial e-mail from using false return addresses to disguise their identity (spoofing) and the use of directories to generate such mailers.

In addition, it prohibits use of misleading subject lines and requires that emails include an easily visible 'opt-out' mechanism. The legislation also prohibits senders from 'harvesting' addresses from Web sites.

Violations constitute a 'misdemeanor crime' - subject to up to one year in jail.

One major point that requiring attention in this issue with spam is:

Spam is now coming from other countries in ever-greater numbers. Foreign emails are harder to fight, because they come from outside our country’s laws and regulations. Because the Internet extends beyond borders and internet users tend to have 'global mindset' when using the internet, the U.S. laws are fine where they can be employed and upheld - but are not sufficient to stop the collective 'Spam problem.'




What can be done about this?

Well - here are the top 5 Suggestions to protect yourself from spam:


Number 1: Do what you can to avoid having your email address out on the net.
There are products called "spam spiders" that search the Internet for email addresses to send email to. If you are interested, do a search on "spam spider" and you will be amazed at what you will find. Interestingly, there is a site, WebPoison.org, which is an open source project geared to fight Internet "spambots" and "spam spiders", by giving them bogus HTML web pages, which contain bogus email addresses

A couple suggestions for this issue a) use form emails, which can hide addresses or also b) use addresses like sales@company.com instead of your full address to help battle the problem. c) There are also programs that encode your email, like jsGuard, which encodes your email address on web pages so that spam spiders will have difficulty reading your email address.

Number 2: Get spam blocking software. There are many programs out there for this. (try http://www.cloudmark.com/ or http://www.mailwasher.net/ ). You may also buy a professional version. Whatever you do, get the software. It will save you time. The software is not foolproof, but really does help. Often, a certain amount of 'manual set-up' is required, but it's worth it in order to block certain types of email.

Number 3: Use the multiple email address approach.
There are a lot of free email addresses available online. If you feel that you must subscribe to newsletters, then simply create a "back-up" email address. This would be somewhat like giving your cell phone number to only your best friends but the phone number with your voicemail options to everyone else.

Number 4: Attachments from people you don’t know are BAD, BAD, BAD.
A common problem with spam is that they have attachments and attachments can have viruses. Corporations often have filters that don’t let such things pass to you. Personal email is far more "open country" for spamers. General rule of thumb: if you do not know who is sending you something, DO NOT OPEN THE ATTACHMENT. Secondly, look for services that offer filtering. Firewall vendors offer this type of service as well.

Number 5: Email services now have "bulk-mail" baskets. If what you use currently does not support this, think about moving to a new vender. The concept is simple. If you know someone, they can send you emails. If you don’t know them, put them in the bulk email pile and then "choose" to allow them into your circle. Spam Blocking software has this concept as well, but having extra layers seems critical these days, so it is worth looking into.