5 Money Making Tips For Newbies

Tee Riddle Old Archives

Feb 14

image - Get PaidFile This Under General Advice For Newbies: I have an all paid membership site that has given me a vivid insight on why most newbie internet business owners never make money online. My site is just $4.95/month or $49.95/year (no, this is not a promotional post – I’m not even going to link to the site). I am amazed at exactly how many people sign up for the membership and simply don’t have five bucks in their PayPal account a month later to keep the service. I’ll get a couple of notifications from PayPal that the payment subscription has failed and many times I get emails from members asking for more time.

This post isn’t to insult anyone, we all have to learn and that takes time. My membership site is an ad tracking site so I have the unique opportunity to take a peek at what members are promoting and there is definitely a disturbing pattern.

Without naming particular sites, most of those not earning are wasting their time with traffic exchanges, safelists and free for all (FFA) type sites. Crazy things like gifting and survey sites. Others are trying affiliate marketing which takes some skill to gain success. But the biggest common denominator is marketing. Almost every member that loses their account from non-payment has setup a ton of tracking links and has no or very few clicks on their trackers.

My recommendation to new internet marketers?

  1. First of all, subscribe to this blog and newsletter. Seriously, I’m here to help and I won’t take your money to do it.
  2. Second, make some friends. This is one of the best ways to learn the ropes. I love the group of marketers and bloggers we have here. Everyone is quick to help each other and we have fun doing it.
  3. Third, find a mentor. Find someone successful that has the same interests and see if they’ll give you the time of day. If they’re too into themselves to notice you, move on and find the right fit. You don’t have to worship a mentor, just learn from them.
  4. Fourth, Subscribe to every blog that you can find that offers valuable information in your niche. Who cares if they’re your competition? Subscribe anyway and compete as friends and always interact by sharing and commenting.
  5. My fifth, and most important piece of advice – help others. It’s true, you can go a long way by serving others. Go out of your way to help, always acknowledge your friends and don’t be stingy when it comes to giving credit where credit is due.

I’m sure there’s more. I hope more will be added in the comments below. The internet is big enough for all of us to make money and I’d love to see all of my friends get there. Your comments and advice are welcome.

Image Credit: PassionatePhoto.com

About the author

Tee Riddle wrote 33 articles on this blog.

Tee Riddle is a social media enthusiast and co-founder of a weekly Twitter chat, dubbed #gardenchat. He has many hobbies and also blogs about vegetable gardening at Veggie Gardener.

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  • hi,
    its a nice post !
    information provided will be very useful for new internet marketers.
    Thanks for sharing yours ideas.
  • i would like to add another one....if you are a newbie don't go after the money first....there are alot more things to learn than to earn..:) when i started i was totally after to make some money but later had to press the pedal...:)
  • Brian, I agree that #5 is so important. Paying it forward so others can find success will in the long run help your success. You will never receive before you learn to give.

    Also networking with others in your niche is just sound business practice. You scratch my back and I will scratch yours. It can build your business at warp speed.

    It took me two years and a lot of heart ache before I was able to find a few really great people to mentor me. I spent thousands of dollars thinking I was in with a great group of people who were going to help me make money online. A hard experience that I am still digging out from under. It is nice to know that today there are so many great bloggers on the internet helping one another out. It wasn't always this way.
    .-= Denise´s last blog ..Blogger Illustrated: Internet Marketing Defined =-.
  • Hi Denise, it looks like we both took the same road to discover that valuable lesson. It's nice to finally understand. Hopefully others can learn a bit faster from us and skip the long wait.
    .-= Brian D. Hawkins´s last blog ..Do Banner Advertisements Work On Blogs? =-.
  • I think one of the key reasons so many newbies are dropping like flies is because, having bought into the hype of untold riches it's a huge shock to find out it's not true.

    I don't think it has to do with willingness to work, I think it has to do with the economy. Many of us found ourselves suddenly without a job, or one less income coming into the family.

    You do the job search and are not successful. Application after application goes in. You eventually sign on to whatever social system is available.....you still look for work and still don't find any. Before you know it, any savings are gone. Then BAM! You somehow connect with info about making money on the internet - and believe all the hype. But you now have no money.....but the next best thing costs $27, so you find a way to buy it.....and a month later you still have no money......

    In the meantime you have been working your butt off doing what someone said was the killer path to riches.

    The answer? Just keep going I guess because eventually we find forum's like this and sanity prevails.
    .-= rlharding´s last blog ..Mystery Knitter Gives Trees Treat In US Town =-.
  • I think you are absolutely right. It's a shame that the crap finds it's way to those that need something before they can understand that there's an awful lot of hype online. There are legitimate ways of earning online, unfortunately the scams have the luxury of lieing and promising overnight wealth.
  • I really like how you added helping others to the list. Even if there is nothing that we gain personally from helping others out, I think it does several things for us:

    1. It helps us relate with other people and make new connections. In other words, it allows us to be influenced in other ways that we may not expect.

    2. We gain experience from helping others.

    3. Helping others gets rid of any arrogance that we have built up, which is especially not good to have as bloggers. We can relate a lot better with our viewers if we are not arrogant.

    4. It feels realllllly good.

    5. The fact of the matter is that we need/want help from others, and so it makes sense that we would then be willing to help other people as well.
    .-= chrisroane´s last blog ..Code Formatting and Coloring in WordPress without a Plugin =-.
  • Thanks Chris, that's a helpful and well thought out comment. I appreciate it.
  • It's also really important to F-O-C-U-S. One of the reasons I believe many newbies end up quitting is that they try out a lot of the advice
    they pick up (which is a good thing), but get frustrated and give up too soon when nothing seems to be happening (which is obviously bad). As you say, there is tons of good advice out there to help folks, but there's also a lot of ignorance and misinformation which obscures the good stuff. The key to success is finding a strategy that works and sticking with it.
    .-= Rod@kids portable dvd players´s last blog ..Fisher-Price Kid Tough portable DVD player =-.
  • F-O-C-U-S - Good tip Rod.
  • Nice tips for those that are just getting started in IM. I have one to add to that list.

    6. Work hard and keep working hard. Most people fail at internet marketing because they do not see immediate results and then give up.
    .-= Nathan Miller@H. Pylori Treatment´s last blog ..H. Pylori Treatment and Cure =-.
  • I agree Nathan, thanks.
  • I'd also like to say do your own research. There's information from blogs that you subscribe to but it would also help if you can find information yourself. One day you'll have to stop depending on others and become the mentor yourself.
  • An admirable goal Darren, striving to be a mentor. I like it :)
  • I have to agree with you. I own a few affiliate marketing sites and see lots of people wasting time using the traffic exchanges. Safelists I have to say work, because I get sales coming in everyday from my affiliates using them.

    I Even have a few affiliates that contact me on MSN complaining that they have 3000 hits to their affiliate site, and haven't made a sale yet, then I go and see that all the traffic was from a TE.

    It amazes me that these people work so freaking hard to make a few bucks online, and they waste their hole time surfing for credits.

    I will never under stand that.
  • Hi Trevor, I know, it's very frustrating to see all that wasted effort. I tend to agree with you on the safelists but I don't trust most of them. A well run list that's kept clean can work well. I use to run five of them and I have a friend that still runs a few. Her name is Dee, check it out: Dustys Magical Marketing
  • Ovi
    Tip number three is really difficult because anyone dont want to share their success secret.So getting a real mentor is not easy.
    .-= Ovi´s last blog ..EUSE Scholarship Programme 2010/2011 =-.
  • Good point Ovi, also some niches are so saturated with lies and deception it's hard to know who to believe. IM and make money online niches are terrible.
  • Good advice, as usual, Brian.

    I'd also advise everyone to test what they're doing and watch the stats. If you're promoting something that isn't profitable, then why continue doing it?

    I had some success with traffic exchanges, for example, but eventually felt like I was on a never-ending treadmill and was constantly being bombarded with new offers and programs that had to be joined, evaluated, perhaps promoted, and then spend some time to see if they were profitable.

    Eventually, when I really started analyzing my stats, I discovered that I was working very hard to basically break even or make a small profit.

    It turned out that, even though I'd joined over 1,000 affiliate programs and was actively marketing quite a few of them, the great majority of my income was coming from less than a dozen of them.

    So, I chose to drop the ones that took a lot of effort and produced small profits so that I could focus on the few of them that paid their way. (Actually, I'm still in the process of dropping programs that don't work for me.)

    We all know of the Pareto Principle (the 80/20 rule) that says that 80% of our profits are produced by 20% of our efforts and, conversely, that 80% of our problems arise from 20% of our efforts.

    So, if we can test and determine which of our efforts are producing the most problems, we can eliminate them and move forward with more focus.

    If we understand which of our efforts produce the most profits, then we can focus on them in order (hopefully) to grow those profits.

    Without testing and analyzing what we learn, we can continue on a treadmill to nowhere -- and, while that can make us feel like we're being busy, it's no way to build a business.

    All the best,

    JD
    .-= John Dilbeck´s last blog ..Lemons or Lemonade? =-.
  • Great points John. Testing is an absolute must, especially with affiliate programs. I love that term, 'never-ending treadmill' because I can absolutely relate to that. Years ago I was into the traffic exchanges too. I was up to about $400/week in one of them. Remember 12 Daily Pro and Stormpay? My account was closed, my Stormpay money frozen and 12 Daily Pro was shut down by the government as a Ponzi Scheme. What a mess and a disappointment. That's not to say all traffic exchanges are ponzi schemes, not at all. I just think our time is better spent with legitimate business and marketing. Good stuff John, I appreciate that.
  • Brian you need to add a number 6... stick at it.

    Many newbie's give up before they give it a chance.

    Also quality information is a must you are 100% correct. As they say you don't know what you don't know (hope that makes sense!)
  • Great point Joe, it takes time. Nice advice.
  • I too must agree most with #5. Helping others help you may be a cliche, but cliches are what they are for a reason...hmm, isn't that a cliche also?
    .-= Dennis Edell´s last blog ..Two Plugins Needed – What Do You Recommend? =-.
  • lol, you're right Dennis. A cliche wouldn't be a cliche if it wasn't popular opinion.
  • Of course, it's a cliche that could easily turn into its own clique, and in the blogging world, that's not such a bad thing.
    .-= Mitch´s last blog ..Marketing Or Advertising Your Business =-.
  • Sixth - work hard! and work all the time! This is so true at the beginning, and remains true thru the end. At the outset, there's a lot of learning and development to be done. Without intense, borderline desperate efforts, its difficult to build momentum and bust thru plateaus.
    .-= Will@laser hair removal´s last blog ..How Effective Is Laser Hair Removal? =-.
  • Well said Will, Hard work is a must. Far too many people think because a business is online they can make it without working hard. It takes around the clock effort. Great point.
  • Tip #5 is a biggie, helping other bloggers is a great way to get your roots in and build respect. Buidling respect and trust makes selling your products much easier.
    .-= Extreme John´s last blog ..My Week in Business Marketing =-.
  • And it shows on ExtremeJohn.com. Anyone that knows you online knows you help others all the time :)
  • I will second that comment about ExtremeJohn!
    .-= Keith´s last blog ..Does Your Twitter Account Suffer From Erectile Dysfunction? =-.
  • Glad to see you writing about this, especially since I am not an affiliate or ad master with my sites, usually I am more about products, but am really interested in ads for my 2 newest sites, so I am looking forward to learning more.
    .-= Keith´s last blog ..Comment Links: Are They SEO? =-.
  • Thanks Keith, I'm just getting concerned with how many newbies are wasting their time and eventually giving up. If I had to put a number on it I have to say like 70% or 80%, at least for my members.

    Some of it can be chalked up to those not willing to do the work but a lot of them work their tails off. They're just going down the wrong path.
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