Internet Business

You can make money on the Internet, but you have to be patient. I’m convinced, based on my own personal experiences, that it’s next to impossible to make money fast on the Web, yet alone overnight. However, there are things you can do that will just about guarantee you make money over time.

Tip #1: Find popular keywords. Yahoo has a great little, free tool called Yahoo Keyword Selector Tool. Open it up and type in a word or phrase, and you will be able to see, almost immediately, how many people searched on that term the previous month. Keep trying words and phrases until you hit one that shows at least 10,000 searches.

Tip #2: Build a site around that keyword (or phrase) or a related term but also be sure you think about the competition. For example, the phrase “credit repair” shows a total of more than 184,000 searches. However, you have to know there are lots of big companies competing for that term. So, look down the list of related words (sometimes called the long tail of marketing). Credit repair service, credit repair services and credit repair company show a combined total of nearly 20,000 searches. So building a web site around these keywords might mean less competition.

Tip #3: Content, content, content. The search engines like Google are becoming increasingly sophisticated in terms of finding sites that offer good, helpful content. You should probably build at least 20 pages of good content around your keywords before you even go live. Then keep building more and more pages of relevant content.

Tip #4: Sign up for Google Adsense. Once you get your site up and running, go to the Google site (www.google.com/adsense) and sign up for your free account. Google will review your site over the next few hours or days. If the company believes the site is honest and provides good content for your visitors, you will be approved and can start adding Adsense click-through ads to your site. You will then need to pick an Adsense format and size. Once you do, Google will display the snippet of HTML code you need for Adsense ads. Paste this code into your site’s pages and shazam! Google ads will begin showing up on your site almost immediately. And every time one of your visitors clicks on one of these ads, you earn money.

You won’t get rich quick, but if you follow these tips, you will make money. Naturally, the amount you make will depend on how hard you work and how smart you are about about building a good Web site rich in content and geared to profitable keywords.

Here’s a final good tip. If you’re looking for a great place to vacation, choose Denver. Denver is unique in that it offers the best of two worlds — the fun things to do and see that you find only in a big, sophisticated city, plus the breathtaking scenery, unforgettable vistas and amazing wildlife you find in our nearby Rocky Mountains. To learn more about the best Denver vacation, just go to Just go to http://www.best-denver-vacation.com

Douglas Hanna is a retired advertising and marketing executive. He has lived in the Denver area for nearly 35 years and is the author of more than 125 articles on Internet marketing, family finances and the city of Denver.

Share This

When I first went into business for myself five years ago as a marketing and public relations consultant, I struggled with setting my fees. Even though I had been making a good salary working for someone else in this capacity, at first I found it difficult to set my fees at what they truly were worth (plus the added 20%-30% for overhead for being an sole proprietor!).

Then I learned about “dollarizing” (a topic for another article) and about looking at the results that I was creating for my clients. I also had to build my confidence and comfortability in telling prospective clients what my fees were without stammering…

I don’t struggle with this anymore, for a few reasons. One reason is because I KNOW what a difference I can and do make in my client’s business. And another reason is that I have loads of clients, past and present, who continue to tell me what a difference I’ve made for them in their business. Both of these have helped to build my confidence and comfortability factors in setting my rates.

Now it’s easy for me to say that my coaching rates are $350 an hour, or that a private mentorship with me starts at $5000. Obviously that means I have fewer clients than I did when I was charging $350 a month (as opposed to an hour), but it also means I work one-on-one a lot less, which frees up an incredible amount of time.

And, by packaging my knowledge into information products, I actually help MORE people now than ever before, and I love that!

Now, my business has gone through more than one iteration over the last five years, so I don’t want to give the impression that this happened quickly for me, because it didn’t. But it could happen for you a lot faster if you implement some of the tips I’ve given you here:

1. Consider yourself the expert.

Why wait for someone else to crown you something? Seriously, if you didn’t think you knew what you were doing, you wouldn’t have taken the leap into entrepreneurship. So make yourself the expert and put yourself out there as such.

Why? Because you’ll build credibility faster, your name will be the one that comes to mind when people are in need of what you offer, and because it will allow you to command higher fees that people are willing to pay.

People want to hire someone who is an expert in solving their problem. For example, I started out as a generalist in marketing and public relations (and web development), and I did ok money-wise as such. Then I started focusing on working with entrepreneurs in marketing their business, and financially I did better. Now I focus on online marketing for a specific niche (solo service professionals) using the multiple streams marketing and product funnel model, and my client base and income has increased exponentially! My business is also a lot easier and much more fun!

2. Increase your income by increasing your fees.

Like I did, most of my clients struggle with this issue at first. It’s normal. They’re afraid of losing clients (they will), and of charging themselves out of their market (they won’t). But, among other things, I encourage them to remember that if they charge more, they don’t need as many clients, and by having less clients, they will have more time and freedom to do the things they enjoy (and even more so if they create products to offer to their niche - see #3).

If there’s still resistance, I suggest that any new clients they accept, they do so at their new higher rate, and keep their current clients at their old rate.

3. Package what you know.

Stop trading time for money and start packaging what you know. By this I mean creating information products that you can sell to your niche that helps them solve their problem at a much lower rate than working with you one-on-one.

This has made a huge difference for me particularly over the past year with the birth of my daughter. Creating products for my niche helped me to continue to bring in the revenue I “lost” by not taking on any new one-on-one clients while I raised her.

There are many ways to leverage your time and talent, but these three will get you started in the right direction to building a more satisfying business for you ~ one that gives you the freedom to enjoy both your work and your life.

Copyright 2006 Alicia M Forest and ClientAbundance.com

Alicia M Forest, MBA, Multiple Streams Queen & Coach

Share This

Do you have a product or service that you want to sell on the Internet? If so, there are a few fundamental components that you must know. Putting your product or service up for sale is easy. You can find a cheap hosting plan and get a 1-5 page site up within a few hours. But what happens next?

Unfortunately, most businesses will never sell their product successfully on the Internet. Their sites may be flashy, but they are not receiving visitors. To receive an endless supply of free, targeted, leads from the search engines you should consider a few of the 5 tips below.

Tip #1- Provide High Quality Content

Providing content does more than give out generic information. Providing content builds trust between you and your visitor. The more content you give, the bigger the bond. Your content should focus around very specific keywords. Each page on your website should be optimized and focused on one keyword.

Finding keywords is a task in and of itself. I will be the first to admit that hunting down keywords with a high demand and low supply is not the easiest task in the world. It can be boring and repetitive. After awhile the numbers will blend together and you will feel a bit dazed. But do not stop now! Keywords are the foundation for your content pages and for your business.

Tip #2- Find Relevant Linking Partners

The days of trading links with any old site are gone. There was a period in time when search engines counted how many links in you had to your site. They factored that and determined if your site was good or not. So if your site had 300 other sites linking to it, search engines would have probably considered it a better site than one with only 10 incoming links.

Search engines have wised up since those days. Now search engines place more emphasis on relevant links. Your site should only link to other sites that are high quality and relevant. If your site is about cookies then you should not be linking to a site about gambling. It doesn’t make sense for your site visitors, and it doesn’t make sense to the search engines.

When you trade links with a relevant, high quality site be sure you specify where your link should be placed, for how long, and what it should say. I often see people exchange links and within a few days the linking partner has taken down the link. Only do business with trusted webmasters.

Tip #3- Submit Your Site to Site Directories

This is a great way to get high quality and high ranked sites to link to you. Think of a link to your site as a vote of confidence. Site directories are less popular than search engines, but their link to you helps you increase in search engine rankings. Be wary of any site directory that makes you pay for submission. There are plenty of great directories that allow you to submit your site for free.

Getting as specific as possible with site directories is a great idea. If your site is about cookies, you should try to find a site directory that only deals with desserts or foods. General directories are fine, but be sure you submit your site to the appropriate category. General directories tend to have a category for almost any topic.

Some site directories will ask you to link to them first. This is your choice. I do not link or pay to get into any site directory. There are too many free ones that do not require a link back. Remember to place only relevant links on your site. Would your cookie site visitors want to click on a link for a site directory?

Tip #4- Add a Site Map

A site map is a single webpage that contains links to all the other pages on your site. Adding a map will help your visitors find information quickly. Besides being a helpful tool for visitors a site map also helps search engines find pages. When a search engine spider visits your site it crawls through a page. It visits all the links on your page and it checks for keywords. This is why keywords and relevant linking partners are recommended above.

Once the search engine spider finds the site map it will find all of your other pages. Search engine spiders do not like to dig very deep into sites. They like to search through 2 or 3 ‘levels’ of information. So pages that are hard to find will not rank well or they will take much longer to rank well. A site map helps the engines find all your pages at once.

Tip #5- Be Patient and Find Other Means of Traffic

Waiting for the search engines to scour your site and rank it could take a bit of time. I recommend a lot of patience. When I post a new content page on my website, it takes a few weeks to get noticed. Some search engines are fast and rank the page immediately. Others are a bit slower.

While you wait for your pages to rank well I recommend finding alternative ways to drive traffic to your site. You can look into PPC (pay-per-click advertising), article writing, off-line ads, buying ad space in newsletters, doing a joint venture with a fellow webmaster or post in relevant forums.

These 5 tips to ranking well at the search engines are tried and true methods. I have built a site using these 5 tips and can personally attest to their sheer power. Patience is the hardest part. Keep building relevant content, link to relevant partners, submit to site directories, add a site map and then keep going.

Persistence pays off. Building a web business takes time. Your business needs to develop and mature. Using some or all of the above tips can ensure a big payoff down the road.

Copyright 2006 strength-training-woman.com

Lynn VanDyke builds successful websites. She provides several options for business owners including a “Jump Start Your Online Business” CD-ROM. Visit http://www.LynnVanDyke.com to learn more about her and her services. Lynn’s content website is ranked in all 3 major search engines and is in the top 1% of all websites worldwide according to Alexa.

Share This