Ways to Make Extra Money|A Short Rant

Looking for Ways to Make Extra Money?

I’m going to keep this relatively short. If you are searching for a wonderful “money making package” that will make you rich in the next thirty days, it doesn’t exist. Well, maybe I should rephrase that. If you are looking for a legitimate way to make money for the long term, and you see a promise of riches in the next thirty days, don’t take the bait.

Why am I making this post? Simply because I have done enough in the internet marketing field to know that there is a large group of people who simply seem to keep coming up with wonderful new products that will take the marketing world by storm. Each new package claims to be the end all product for making all the money you will ever need. What I really can’t stomach is the fact that much of the time, the plan is for you to basically resell the same package to hungry suckers who are desperately looking for the best ways to make money online. They, in turn, are expected to do the same thing to the next batch of stooges who follow their amazing plan. To be honest, it makes me sick to see people taken advantage of in this way.

This isn’t to say that you can’t make money online. If you couldn’t, I would not be keeping this blog. The thing is, the idea of making money is one of those things that puts a crazy gleam in some people’s eyes. It doesn’t take much to convince someone who is starving to take a bite of a hamburger, and it doesn’t take much to get these folks to believe that they really will make money instantly just by following a few simple steps. Seriously, if it was that easy to follow “the plan” and make ten thousand dollars per week, why in the world would these people be bothering with putting together all of these wonderful packages and then selling them for some measly amount?

I guess this is a bit of a rant, so I’m just going to go ahead and mention some things that really bother me about the Internet Marketing world.

These are things that I think give the whole idea of making money online a bad name…

Long Sales Letters. Oh how I despise them. I know that the common belief is that these things really work. I guess that must be true because there are a lot of “Gurus” making a ton of money with them. I think you learn to ignore them after a while. Honestly, since I joined The Keyword Academy over a year ago, I’ve taken myself off of most of the IM mailing lists, but even before I dumped them, I had gotten to the point where I just used to scroll to the bottom of the sales letter to see how much money they were asking for. All of the preceding stuff was usually the same junk.
Gurus who advise you to go after the Make Money Online niche. If anyone tells you, as a beginner, to go after this niche with their product, just say “No Thanks!” and walk away. It is true that there are tons of people doing searches on this topic, but the field is extremely saturated by people who have tons of experience and probably also have armies of people building backlinks for them. It is no place for a newbie. Even though this blog is based on a “make money” keyword, I have no delusions of ranking for the term unless some folks suddenly start pointing links at this domain. I bought this domain back before I knew much better and I just decided to use it as more of a journal of my journey to making money online. If people find it, I hope it helps them. Anyway, I got sidetracked. There are much easier niches to go after if you want to make some extra money online with a website. Weight loss is pretty much sewn up too.
Internet Marketing websites that won’t let you escape. There are a couple versions of this one. The

photo credit: petesimon

lesser of the two evils are the sites that throw up the tricky little “before you leave” box that makes you read everything twice to decide whether you need to click on “cancel” or “OK” to get out of town. The ones I really can’t stand are the sites that simply won’t let you navigate away from the site.
Gurus who want you to think they are just like you. Ugh. If I read one more time about how “Place Name Here” just wanted to spend more time with their family, lost their job and spent their last $20 on some marketing package, put this together as a way to say “thanks”, just wanted to give something back…and so on, I might just puke. That is part of why I stopped reading the sales letters. They all said basically the same thing and followed the same formula. First is the sob story which ties smoothly to how they are just like “you” (an average Joe or Jane). Then comes the story of how they found this miraculous solution that netted them boatloads of money and turned their lives around. This of course is followed by them explaining that they feel like they just have to help people (like you) or give something back (yeah, for $197). Next come the testimonials with all of those happy looking people who usually don’t look like rocket scientists (if they could do it, you can too, right?). Sometimes there are some genuine looking screen shots of how much whoever made in a month (those could never be faked, could they?). Finally, you get to the part where they start listing all of the wonderful bonuses they’ll throw in if you buy NOW. Here is the part I just love…they tell you what it is “valued at”. By whom exactly? Good grief, I could tell you that the information you are reading right now is “valued at” $10,000 and that I must be insane for giving it away for free! What a stinking joke. Finally, they start reeling you in by teasing you with what the final price will be. You start at the “valued at” number and go down a couple of hundred bucks at a time until they tell you about their “limited time offer” that is available for “just” $__ (fill in the blank with some number ending in “7″). If they had asked for that amount at the beginning of the letter for anything, you’d have thought they were insane, but after all of the above, people actually buy. Anyway, I don’t like getting them or reading them.
“Turnkey” Businesses That Rip People Off. There are some legitimate services out there that are very helpful when you want to start building up an online business. Many of them in fact, and I use some myself. What I cannot stand is programs that focus on newbies and basically offer to set up a website with hosting and then nail the recipient for hundreds of dollars for what they could have done themselves for a fraction of the cost. Buyer beware I guess, but you should know that you can buy domains for about ten bucks and get them hosted for about $10 per month (even less actually). WordPress is very easy to use for getting your content online and Google loves it. It is also completely free. That is really all you need to start out. You could even start with a free Web 2.0 type of site if you like and skip the hosting, but you run the risk involved with not actually owning your site. If you are paying much more than that, someone is very glad that they met you.

There really are legitimate ways to make money online. Some people use affiliate marketing, some sell products, some people like programs like Adsense or Chitika. The opportunities are there. The painful fact that some people do not want to accept though, is that NONE of them suddenly start filling your wallet with cash over night. It just doesn’t happen. If you are willing to take on the challenge of actually investing time and effort to build a business, you can earn a living online. If you allow yourself to constantly get distracted by the newest shiny object offered in your email, you will find a constant stream of marketers willing to take your money until you finally get frustrated and quit because you are convinced that making money online is impossible.

photo credit: the half-blood prince

Be smart. If someone stopped you on the street and told you that for $197 he could make you rich in a month, would you hand over the cash? Probably not. Before you click the Paypal button and buy the next “making money package”, sleep on it. Try to look at it objectively. When I started out, I quickly learned how to kick myself in the butt because I fell for so many of those “make easy money online” scams. Learn from that. Don’t fall for “reviews” of the products that are posted by people selling it as an affiliate product. FTC guidelines now say that they must disclose on their site if they will be making money when you follow their links. Look for that statement. If you don’t see it, use the contact form on their site to ask if they are an affiliate for the product. If you can’t find any contact form, move on to the next site. Don’t be a sucker.