Where Not to Spend Money in Internet Marketing

By Jeff Mulligan (c) 2004

There are four general categories of ways to spend money in the internet marketing arena. Before you spend another penny, think about which category you fall in and which category the investment falls in. Make sure they match.

Four Categories of Investment

1. Education - learn how to do something
2. Tools - generally the software you need such as hosting, autoresponders, testing software, etc.
3. Marketing - the money you invest to drive traffic to your site
4. Opportunity - a "business in a box" that is ready for you
   to promote. May include a product with resale rights and a
   web site template.

Three Categories of Internet Marketers

1. Newbie - just learning. Frequent victim of Information Overload.
2. Intermediate - has a site that makes some money.
3. Advanced - Making a good full time income from the internet.

If you are a newbie, you should be investing in education.   You need to learn how this business works before you spend your hard-earned money on anything else.

Look at it this way: How would you know which tools you need, which opportunity is legit or what kind of marketing to do if you haven't learned how things work?

If you don't understand the business you will fall prey to the great copy writers. You will be convinced to buy things you probably don't need.

"Opportunities" are especially dangerous.  How can you possibly tell if an opportunity makes good business sense if you don't understand the business yet?  Opportunities are where the most money is wasted.  Because most opportunities are good for the owner, but may not be so good for the customer.  They prey on the uneducated.

Newbies figure that because the internet is so big and complicated, businesses that sound too good to be true might work on the net.  In reality, they do not.

Look at it this way: You've got to LEARN before you EARN.

Intermediate marketers understand the big picture of how things work.   They know what tools they should invest in. They know what kind of traffic works for their sites.  And they can judge which opportunities may work for them.

Wise intermediates still invest in education. They realize that things change and it's important to stay on top of the business.

Advanced marketers probably own the tools they need. (They may have even developed some tools of their own.) They may not need to spend much on marketing either - they often have affiliates who are doing lots of marketing for them.

But smart ones are always testing new marketing strategies.  And I've been amazed to see that lots of these advanced marketers are attending seminars.   Even the ones who are doing the teaching are sitting in the audience for the next guy. They continue to learn.

The important thing in all this is to realistically assess where you are in this cycle so that you are investing your money in the right place at the right time.

The learning never stops.  And more learning equals less wasted money.

About the Author:  Jeff Mulligan has an MBA and 20+ years of marketing
experience as an ad agency Senior VP and VP Marketing for two software companies, one of which was publicly traded.  Jeff owns CBmall, a site that provides 15 different ways for ClickBank affiliates to earn income on thousands of  popular InfoProducts and affiliate programs..

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