I have been working online for a little over two years now.  I have learned more than I ever thought I would about making money from the internet.  But, it doesn’t come easy (and if it does it will probably be gone just as easy).  You really have to work hard at learning the very best ways for you to earn online.  I started solely as an affiliate marketer.  I didn’t have a website.  I found products I thought would sell, products that I liked and dove into the crazy, intricate world of online marketing.  WOW, was that a HUGE – there is sooooo many opportunities to create an income from working online.  The problem I had was stumbling onto something immediately and making over $3000 on a $10 product in my first 3 months online.  Once this dried up, I spent the next 8 months trying to duplicate this – with only limited success.  I decided I needed a website, but couldn’t decide what I wanted to sell.  So, I decided to start a blog – I could do anything from a blog, sell affiliate products, sell advertising, sell myself  (get your mind out of the gutter, I’m talking about my writing abilities, graphic artist abilities, etc.)  . . The MOST important thing I’ve learned is to never become complacent the internet is constantly changing at lightning speed.   What is hot and lucrative today will become over used and abused and out by tomorrow.  Continue researching and trying to find that new product or market to enhance your online presence and moneymaking ability.

Titus Hoskins from Bizware Magic says it well:. One of the questions I see repeatedly online is:  How do I make money online from my blog or website? You can’t just slap a few lines of Google Adsense code on your pages and hope to start raking in thousands. The solution to earning income fromyour online site or blog can be as complex or as simple as you want to make it.  There are thousands of ways to earn money from your site or blog… among the most common are selling advertising, selling your own products, using affiliate programs, drop-shipping, donations, Google Adsense… the list goes on. First, let’s make some distinctions between what exactly you are monetizing – your website or your traffic?  This may seem pragmatic to many, but any professional webmaster or marketer who has dissected this issue will have discovered how you approach this problem will greatly affect how much income you will derive from your sites. To the savvy professional marketer it is more an issue of refinement than anything else. They make the distinction between a general monetization of a website and a highly targeted monetization of their site’s traffic. There is a difference.  Any webmaster can place ads on their sites to get an income.  If you have a normal amount of traffic, you can monetize your site with ads such as Adsense and you will receive your monthly checks. But is this the best way?Any professional marketer knows you can easily get 100 times what you can get from Google Adsense by using other means of monetizing their sites. It comes down to a marketing strategy that involves monetizing the traffic coming to their sites, rather than just monetizing the sites themselves. Not all the traffic to your site or blog is looking for the same thing. You can have general traffic, searching for information on a broad subject area, or you can have someone looking for a specific product or service. Therefore, you must closely monitor your traffic to find out exactly what your visitors are looking for and then providing these visitors with a solution. Individually monetizing your pageviews, traffic and landing pages is the key to deriving larger amounts of income from your online sites. Just as “long tail keyword” marketing can greatly increase your income, so too can constructing income sources directly related to your long tail keyword traffic. Using affiliate products and services from third party affiliate networks like Commission Junction LinkShare, ClickBank… will earn you 10 times more income than you would earn from using Adsense; most times it is much more. The prudent professional marketer will closely examine their site’s traffic logs to find out exactly the source of the traffic and the keywords their visitors are using to find their site. These marketers will closely examine their traffic and then take steps to monetize it. It may involve producing their own products or services to offer to these visitors. It may be using an affiliate program to offer a product. They also know that “keywords,” the exact words someone types into a search engine to find what they’re looking for on the web, are the real main sources of targeted traffic on the web. Quality traffic that’s worth its weight in gold. Domination of the main keywords in your market or niche will spell monetary success even for webmasters whose main goal may not be making money from their sites… these strange creatures do exist I am told! Aggressive marketers will take a different route, especially if they have gained domination in a niche area; many approach other businesses in their niche with offers of partnerships and independent deals… they supply the leads or customers to these businesses in return for a percentage of the sale. I personally go for “residual income deals” where I get a percentage of the revenues generated for the life of the clients I refer. Large multinational companies in your targeted niches probably won’t give you the time of day, but smaller, lesser known companies will give you lucrative deals if it is a “win-win situation” for both parties. This is my number ONE way to monetize my traffic. Any professional marketer will also aggressively market their traffic by collecting opt-in lists of interested customers. These marketers will offer free product buying guides, valuable information, deals/coupons, customer ratings…all to capture leads because then instead of just having one chance to market to their site’s traffic, they get many more chances in follow-up emails. Studies have shown it might take 6 or 7 follow-ups before a sale is made. ROT – Return On Traffic These marketers “add value” or “pre-sell” to their site’s traffic in order to increase their odds of producing more income from this traffic. They never forget this traffic is the real source of their site’s income; instead they exploit it to their full advantage. No reason why you can’t do the same.  Always keep in mind, you should develop different sources of traffic: search engine traffic, article traffic, social bookmark traffic, link traffic from related sites, viral traffic with free PDF files, PPC advertising… if one traffic source dries up, it won’t be a major problem for you. Likewise, like most things to do with business, it is never wise to just use one tactic or source of income. I have always used a “multiple income streams” strategy. On any given site I may use Google Adsense for general traffic, affiliate products for my more targeted ‘long tail keyword’ traffic and, of course, I give priority to special independent deals with long-term residual income. Even higher PPC (Pay Per Click) bids are possible with residual deals, as you will recoup your investment down the road. Similarly, it is a good business practice to find or promote companies that will give you a “cookie for life,” which means once you refer a customer – they are yours for life. Marlon Sanders does this, so too does Ken Evoy’s Site Build It, where your customers are yours for life. Also promoting products like web hosting, marketing tools, and utility services that have recurring income are very lucrative sales to make. Believe me, getting a monthly payment for a sale you made five years ago will put a slight smile on your face every time! So the next time you’re trying to monetize your site or blog – first take a real close look at the your site’s traffic, monitor your site’s raw traffic logs to find out what your visitors are looking for on each page of your site and supply a solution for them. Be it your own products, affiliate offerings or even Google Adsense ads… along the way make sure you offer them valuable content to help them on their quest and help you to collect their contact information for further follow-up. Of course, savvy marketers will create or make the above scenario happen from the get-go; they find a product, they target and dominate the keywords for that product in all the search engines and then harvest this traffic with killer landing pages, opt-in forms and special bonuses if you buy from their links. They use this traffic and this marketing strategy to sometimes obtain obscene amounts of income from the web. Your success or failure in obtaining the same results will largely depend upon your own skill level, but mostly it will depend on the amount of work you put in to earn this income. This process is so simple, yet so complex to perfect, but with a little work and some practice anyone can monetize their site’s traffic to get the best returns. Affiliate Marketing Tips for Monetizing Your Traffic Since I am a full-time affiliate marketer, most of the above post is biased or geared towards affiliate marketing. It is a simple way to derive income from your sites without having to worry about handling sales, supply problems, customer complaints… all you have to do is supply the lead or potential customer to your promoted affiliate programs and let them do the rest. All tracking, sales, product delivery… are handled by the affiliate company, which lets you concentrate on marketing, producing content, search engine optimization and promotion. However, it is not the most profitable way to monetize your traffic. Perhaps the most profitable way to monetize any traffic is to produce your own products and/or services. But this usually takes some time and skill level beyond the ordinary webmaster; and it does create additional headaches like product delivery, support issues, sales records, taxes… everything associated with running a business or company. If you’re like me and go the much easier affiliate route, here are some tips for you:

1. Use well established affiliate networks like Commission Junction, LinkShare, Shareasale, ClickBank… all these are professionally run, which makes finding affiliate links/products extremely easy for you. Besides, they will deliver your checks on time.

2. Aim for or promote affiliate products that have residual or recurring income because these will be your most lucrative over the long haul. Pick ones like web hosting, marketing products, utilities… or other services, which once people sign up for, rarely change.

3. Concentrate your marketing on small, little known niches. Dominate the main keywords in that niche with your sites and then create special “residual” income with the main companies in that niche.

4. Pick affiliate products that have lifetime cookies and/or have high payout rates. You can promote anything; why not promote high-ticket items that pay the big commissions.

5. However, picking the highest paying products may not be your only choice. For example, I have found promoting Amazon products usually pays less than my other affiliate products, BUT the conversion rate for Amazon products is much higher so you sell many more products and earn many more (albeit smaller) commissions, which quickly add up to a nice sum.

6. I have had success by concentrating on well-known products that you can only purchase online. Smart tactic that pays off, especially when those companies offer coupons/deals that are only available online.

7. Marketing in foreign markets has proven very lucrative for me. Usually getting top ranking in these countries is much easier than in the very competitive U.S. marketplace. For instance, marketing in the UK is less competitive, and you get higher commissions when you consider the pound is equal to two bucks in USD. I use Affiliate Window for marketing in the UK.

8. PPC advertising is the fastest way to deliver targeted traffic to your pages, but you have to know exactly what you’re doing or you will lose money. Here, I concentrate on promoting products with proven residual income so that I can make higher bids since my initial investment will be returned to me, many times over in the coming years.

9. If you’re a one-marketer, one-person company, you will have to choose your affiliate products very carefully. Pick only top quality products to promote, preferably ones you use yourself. Your conviction will come through in your content or writing

10. The more knowledge you obtain about affiliate marketing the more income you will make. But choose your learning sources very carefully, like that saying on old maps: “here there be monsters”. Be careful. Choose your educators wisely. Here are two sources I would recommend for further study on Affiliate Marketing: try Ken Evoy’s free Affiliate Masters Course or try one of top self-help guys Steve Pavlina – he has a very good page here on how to make money from your blog.