Having been in this business for over 14 years I have seen pretty much everything from every angle. I have dealt with all kinds of people and about 98% of those experiences have been positive.

I can’t even begin to guess how many emails I have answered in those 14 years but it is a lot.

The one thing that most of the emails I receive have in common is the intense desire the person writing has to succeed in online marketing.

But we all know that there is a ton of garbage online, products where the person doing the selling knows full well the claims made are complete and total B.S.

The bottom line is if someone promises you riches and especially quick riches, run, just get the hell away, and move on. It’s not going to happen unless you win the lottery.

I’ve always had one primary mission with any business I’ve been involved in, and that is to help people succeed.

Now I’m not going to in any way try and make the case that everyone I have tried to help has succeeded, many have not.

And it’s not for lack of me trying and it’s often not from the lack of the other person not trying. Sometimes an individuals skill set is not suited to a specific task or career, as well as another person’s might be. Not everyone is good at everything.

I can ski. I’ve tried to teach a lot of people to ski. Most never achieve anywhere near the degree of skill that I have. Not everyone is born to be a good skier. Bottom line.

But let me get to the point I want to make, and this is where the rant comes in..

We all know that the economies in most of the western countries have not been great this past year or two.

In that time I have received quite a number of emails from customers or potential customers who have told me a very similar story. That they need quick money, they lost their job, they need to make this work or they are going to lose their house, they are looking for some kind of guarantee that I can solve their problems with some product or service that I am offering.

They want a guarantee that such and such a product will get them out of their dilemma.

Let’s look at a couple realities.

If you are in need of quick cash, or on the verge of losing your home, or something that falls into the really awful category, do not, I said DO NOT even think about online marketing as your salvation. It is not. Online marketing is a career, a business, it is not a means of getting quick cash in your pocket.

Do not, I repeat DO NOT spend any money with me or anyone else if you are down to your last dime. It’s not that you can’t make money online, but that is not your immediate problem if you happen to need a quick infusion of cash. You need to resolve the immediate problem before thinking long term.

Once you get things under control, then you can consider other options for building a business but when you are down to your last few pennies and are on the verge of losing your home, please don’t look at the online world as your way of getting out of the hole you are in. Your hole will only get deeper.

But I think it’s so easy to understand why people naturally turn to the Internet as a way out of serious financial problems, and it has to do with all the B.S. hype surrounding far too many products. And let me be specific, I’m not talking about a sales letter that tries to get you to buy a product, that is advertising, what I’m talking about are the hucksters who prey on the newbies or those very people needing quick cash, making claims of fortunes to be made in a very short time, telling you how you can make tens of thousands each month. It’s all B.S. And the sooner most people accept that the better off everyone will be.

My goal is to teach people how to make $500 not $50,000 in a month. Believe me. For most people earning $500 in a month in what could be considered extra income is in fact, life changing money.

But here’s the really sad part of how the promises of get rich quick schemes have hurt people in ways most people never consider.

In the past year alone, I have received a lot of emails stating all the things I mentioned above.

I own several businesses, and in 21 of those cases, I have actually offered people a chance to work for one of my businesses. In other words, I would pay them for work they do. It costs the person nothing. Yes it does involve real work, and while the pay may not earn you 50K per year it certainly can earn you 4 figures per month, plus the offer allowed people to work on their time and work as much or as little as they wanted, but the key word here is work. it required people to work.

Guess how many of those 21 offers I made were accepted?

ZERO.

And you know what? I don’t blame the people who did not take my offer. I don’t think these people are lazy or are people that really don’t want to succeed, quite the contrary. I feel the problem is in most cases, that they have fallen victim to the hype, that they can make a lot more, a lot faster with a lot less work if they just find the right ‘program’ online.

The even more amazing thing is that many of these very same people have probably already been around the block so to speak, with quite a number of over hyped products that promised the very things they are still searching for without success. And they still don’t realize, it doesn’t work that way.

I really hope that none of you falls into this category but if you do, a reality check is in order.

What I do is not a hobby, it’s a business, and most people fail to understand that making money online involves creating and running a real business.

As the title of this post states, internet marketing is great but… it’s a career choice, a real business, not a get rich quick scheme.

There’s a lot of really good people in this business, but also a lot of hucksters. Remember the old adage, if it sounds to good to be true… it probably is.

- Dave -

It’s not that I am really interested in buying any of the offers
these people make me, though I will never say never as sometimes
there are some real gems in their offers, but it’s their process
that intrigues me.

You see, even though I’ve been making my living online for over
13 years, I’ve never been a big list marketer, but that is one of
the things that I have begun to focus on over the past year or
so.

But the best way to learn is not really from buying some super
expensive course but to literally observe what others are doing.

My buddy and sometimes business partner Chris Rempel is a great
example. While Chris certainly offers quality products that a lot
of folks can benefit from, just reading his emails, and following
his methodology is a tutorial unto itself. And one which you
don’t have to pay a penny for.

I’m always amazed when people complain about receiving
newsletters, and send you nasty emails demanding you remove them,
newsletters that they willingly subscribed to, and have an easy
unsubscribe link at the bottom, These people are seemingly not
realizing that they are complaining about the very process which
they are trying to understand and make a living from.

On one hand they are spending time on marketing forums, buying
products, probably in most cases struggling to make a few
dollars, yet are often ignoring the obvious. If you follow the
process involved in many quality newsletters you are getting a
virtual goldmine of free information.

And there is no one exact way to approach the process. You’ll
find so many different styles that are used by different
individuals, but don’t get confused by the differences, it’s what
works for that person.

There are marketers whose newsletters are very short form, just
giving you a link to something they want you to see. There are
others who write very detailed tutorial type newsletters.

There are those who rarely try and sell you anything, and those
who try and sell you something every day.

All of these have a place but not all of them are necessarily the
right fit for you.

But there is an education in these newsletters far beyond the
actual content contained within them.

Who are some of the people whom you read? Some of the people who
you feel have the ‘process’ down and really get this type of
marketing.

Remember, no matter how successful you become in this business,
there is always going to be people who do other things better
than you, the learning curve never really goes away, it just
evolves.

Some of the people whose newsletter process is worth following
are of course, Chris Rempel,  but also Jeff Johnson, Yanik
Silver, Keith Baxter, Shoemoney, and quite a few others. Each of
these individuals has a very different style, and are fairly big
names, but don’t confine yourself to just the big names. You’ll
be amazed at how effective some of the ‘unknowns’ are with this
kind of marketing. And don’t confine yourself to the names I read.
Your list of favorites is probably very different than mine.

Start a folder collecting emails from certain individuals and
you’ll find you have a crash course in list marketing that didn’t
cost you a penny.

- Dave -