Introduction:

Never did I in my wildest imaginings think that I would be involved in creating a successful online business. What finally brought me to this was being fed up with the direction my life was taking me, and my decision to take control of my future and make a change. These changes started out small, but have resulted in a complete renovation of my outlook of the future. I was a mediocre student in high school and joined the military shortly after graduation. After proudly serving my country, I had a new sense of self-discipline. My goals were clear and my drive was unrelenting. I worked through college and graduated with a degree in education. I spent several years as a high school science teacher while supporting a family. My teaching career was robust and fulfilling, and I was able to provide for my family on the meager salary that is so common in the educational field. However, through a series of unfortunate events and family tragedies that happened seemingly all at once, I lost almost everything. Sparing the details I’ll confide that in a very short span of time I had lost dearly loved family members and it that wake came depression, bankruptcy, foreclosure, repossessions, divorce, and the loss of the career I loved. I was financially and emotionally devastated.

For years I went from job to job trying to survive before I landed a job where I could make a living and repair the financial losses I had suffered. But I had lost my drive, my will to succeed and flourish had withered away. Old injuries I had sustained in the military had become aggravated again, and my mobility had become limited. Until one day where I was on a social media site, just clicking away aimlessly. Something inside me asked “how many hours are you going to sit here and scroll through other people’s lives?” I stopped. Then every fiber in my being told me to do something. Anything. I shook my head and looked at the computer screen again, but not at the people who were posting endless pictures of their cats or virtual farming games… I looked at the internet itself, and the vast almost incomprehensible opportunities that it provides. And it’s all right there at our fingertips. The next time my fingers touched the keyboard, it was for a purpose, and I began the journey I am here to tell you about today. How you can use the internet to your advantage, and change your life for the better. My journey to success continues, but yours could be just beginning. The following information will help you get started in the right direction. This is not for everyone, and results will vary with the amount of effort you put into it.

1. Find your niche.

What are you passionate about? What interests you? What can hold your attention? What are your hobbies? You don’t have to be an expert in a field to be able to tell others why you are interested in a hobby or topic. This brings us to what the definition of ‘niche’ is as it pertains to us; a topic, product or hobby that is the focus of a social media or otherwise online media. Put simply: something specific that you provide information on. Gardening, to use as an analogy, has a large online following. People want to know about how to grow plants in their backyard, but the topic is so general that the internet is loaded with content about gardening. What if your favorite vegetable was a tomato? Or more specifically, roma tomatoes. And there are several types of roma tomoatoes (probably), so maybe that could be your niche (again… this is an analogy). Other examples could be fan sites, news blogs about specific events, and collections of articles about a specific topic. You get the idea. Focus on something that you enjoy and use that as the focus of your niche. People want to know about your niche, it’s up to you to get the word out. How do you get your information to your audience on the internet?

2. Create Content

This is where the rubber hits the road. Creating content for your niche can be tricky at first but easier as you get experience. What I mean by ‘content’ is loosely defined as media that contains information about a topic. Pictures, articles, blog posts, video reviews, websites are all examples of content. If you need graphics or stock images, there are thousands online free and available for ‘commercial’ use (Pixbay is an excellent resource). The same goes for music [CLICK HERE for FREE MUSIC you can use]. I’m not going into all the avenues of content creation because there are literally hundreds of different ways you can deliver information on the internet. The point is, whichever direction you decide to go, research several people already making content in the niche you want or close to it. This will give you an idea of what media you may feel more comfortable with. Be flexible! You may want to experiment with multiple types of media. Oh, and for heaven’s sake don’t forget to BACK UP THE FILES ON YOUR COMPUTER!!! Creating content on a computer and having it crash or get a big glass of tea spilled on it can be absolutely devastating!

[iDrive]

3. Social Media

Once you have some content created, you want to share it with the world. If you haven’t already, you’ll want to sign up for at least the ‘big three’ social media giants (Twitter, YouTube and Facebook), and if you have, you may want to make another account solely for your soon-to-be commercial ventures.

Creating YouTube content can be the easiest or the most challenging content to make depending on what your niche is. Know this: YouTube is one of the most widely used SEARCH ENGINES on the internet. That’s right; people go to YouTube and search terms like it was Google, Bing or yahoo. If you are doing reviews on products it can be very easy. Looking at some of the most popular videos on YouTube, one thing many of them have in common is that they are SHORT. The shorter the video, the more of a chance the viewer will watch the whole thing. When you monetize your videos you will want your audience to watch as much of the video if not all of it in order for it to count toward your monetization. So keep it short and to the point.

How to Make Money on YouTube: 101 YouTube Monetization Tips

How To Monetize Your YouTube Channel

12 Ways to Make Money from YouTube

Facebook and Twitter are different animals altogether, although they can be extremely powerful and influence the amount of traffic that you generate (we’ll talk more about traffic later). On these platforms, you can chat, send messages, post your thoughts, but most importantly, you can post your niche content and links. Now, when we talk about your niche content, on Facebook and Twitter you can also post links to articles that pertain to your particular focus. Or even articles you write on a blog. The articles you post can bring you income as well! You don’t even need a website to start! See ‘EARN MONEY SHORTENINGLINKS’ to sign up for ad.fly. It’s the ad with the little bee floating around my website.

By now you should know how to navigate around social media, but you may not know how to optimize these two. Posting your content is at the right time, at times when you may not be online (if you are still working your day job for example), and also they can help you manage your followers. Two of THE BEST programs to optimize your Twitter and Facebook presence that I personally use are HOOTSUITE and [ManageFlitter]. I have used both of these with fantastic results.

If you are feeling especially enthusiastic, you can start your own social media network! [SOCIALENGINE]

4. Your own WEBSITE

Once you have some content you can create a website (either before or after you have set up your social media presence). You can do this a number of ways but the fastest and easiest is going through a web hosting service. There are free websites that you can create through Google, etc. Free sites are (of course) more affordable, but they are limited in what you can do and make your site look like. Also, they may not be the best to be noticed by other search engines (such as BING ).

However, there are affordable plans by reputable web hosting services that are also available (see links below). These services will often help you create your web page, and the more money you put up front the better site you will have. But since you want to start out small, that’s still not a problem because you can have a fantastic site for a just few dollars a month. I suggest you consider the following web hosting services: [FAT COW, GREEN GEEKS, HOSTING24]

Your mission should now be to drive traffic to your website. By posting links to your website on your social media accounts (along with plenty of content), you will draw people to your website, and your content.

6. Affiliate Marketing (THE BIG MONEY MAKER)

Once you have gotten this far, look up “affiliate marketing” on YouTube or Google. Affiliate marketing is how your website will really make money. Affiliate marketing is how you monetize your website by placing targeted advertisements that your audience will see. Once your audience sees an ad on your site, they can click on the ad. If they click on the ad, they will follow the links that ad provides and go to the advertiser’s site where they may purchase goods or services. When they get that far, you automatically get a commission for the sale, the lead, or sometimes even just the click itself.

Affiliate marketing can seem like a complex process, and it takes time to see results. But there is an ENORMOUS wealth of resources on the web for you to research. This will also take some time but it is an investment in your future, so learn EVERYTHING YOU CAN! I have listed just a few links for your convenience below.

COMMISSION JUNCTION - One of the biggest resources in the business!

7 BIG MISTAKES NEW AFFILIATE MARKETERS MAKE

WHAT IS AFFILIATE MARKETING?

Good luck!