Choose the Right Internet Business Model for You

The sad fact is that 95% of Internet marketers fail in their online business. Choosing the wrong Internet business model is often the reason for this alarmingly high failure rate.

Most nebwies buy every eBook and video training course they can find on marketing their online business. Many join expensive membership programs to learn how they too can work only 4 hours a week and rake in the big bucks just like their favorite marketing guru promised.

Sorry folks but it ain’t gonna happen unless you choose the correct online business model that’s right for you.

Internet marketing is full of choices when it comes to different business models. The key to your success lies in doing your homework and finding the one business model that agrees with your way of thinking, business philosophy and your passions.

Once you find a marketing business model that you like, stick with it. Otherwise, you’ll be wasting your time, money and energy hopping from one business to another. Trust me when I say that’s the “secret” to making money online.

There are many flavors and variations but in my opinion, there are five basic online business models that can make you money.

Here are the basic Internet marketing business models:

1. Affiliate Marketing – probably the easiest business model to follow. You don’t need to spend time or money creating your own product. You just need to be good at marketing and promoting someone else’s product(s).

You’ll earn commissions for sending buyers to the product seller’s website. With the right promotional techniques, you can establish yourself in a niche and make affiliate commissions from several different programs all at once.

The biggest drawback I see with this business model is that you do all the heavy lifting of finding customers, pre-selling them and then get them to buy a product. All for a one-time commission check. You are pretty much at the mercy of the product creator and you never know when she/he’ll pull the plug on the offer.

If you do decide affiliate marketing is the right model for you then I suggest you download this FREE Affiliate Marketing Report by Jimmy D. Brown: 3 Keys To Creating Big-Time Commission Checks. In it, you’ll discover how to increase your affiliate sales month after month.

2. Online Auction Business – Online auctions represent an entirely new breed of auction business. Instead of being run by one person or company, a marketplace plays host to hundreds of individuals or companies who want to expand or start an online auction business. It would be next to impossible to accomplish such an auction outside of the Internet.

eBay is one of the most frequently visited sites on the Internet. When you become an eBay seller, you’ll never have to worry about finding traffic for your offering. You can sell a variety of things on eBay, including information products. Although, there have been some recent changes to the way information products are sold on eBay.

The amount of traffic and ease of setting up your offering make eBay a strong business model. The downside is that your business relies on a third party site whose changing rules may have a negative impact on your own business.

I recently read the newly revised and updated version of Internet Marketing Center’s(IMC) “The Insider Secrets To Selling On eBay,” and I’ve got to tell you, it’s a must-have for ANYONE wanting to start earning money with online auctions.

It doesn’t matter if you have NO business experience, NO money to invest, and NO products to sell. IMC’s team of eBay PowerSellers will show you the exact steps you need to follow to start a serious eBay business. Right now, they’ll even let you try out the Insider Secrets to Selling on eBay for a full 30 days for just $2.95!

3. Content Marketing – this is where you create lots of useful content in various niches, drive traffic from search engines and then monetize the content. Some examples are AdSense blogs or websites, selling banner ads on your site and flipping websites (selling a high traffic site to the highest bidder).

You could even become a well-paid freelancer offering your copywriting, web design and/or programming services. Visit elance.com, guru.com or rentacoder.com for hundreds of examples of people making a good living freelancing.

If the AdSense model appeals to you, then one of the best models I’ve found is Matt Callen’s HyperVRE. You can create a long-lasting passive income stream with literally an infinite potential with VRE (Virtual Real Estate) and AdSense websites that produce real proven results, without having any prior website design or marketing knowledge.

4. Info Products Marketing – this is where you create your own products and are in complete control of your online business model. By creating an information product, or hiring a ghostwriter to write one for you, you can sell your product over and over again through your website.

It does require a one-time investment in time or money if you outsource the product creation part, but the real money lies in selling the same product to many customers without any further time or money spent on your end. Most smart product marketers have lots of back-end sales built into their front-end eBooks or videos. This in turn can boost your income many times over the initial sale.

You can set up an affiliate program and recruit others who can sell your products for you.

The only major downside is that you can spend a lot of time and money working on a niche product that may turn out to be not very profitable.

Look at my Information Products Catalog for examples of infoproducts that I have created and are selling through my blog site.

What if you are not up to writing a 50-60 page eBook and don’t have the money to outsource?

You can easily overcome this problem by writing 7-10 page reports and parlay that into a moneymaking business.

My Small Reports Vault has proven to be very profitable. These are small reports on different aspects of Internet marketing. Each small report is about 20 pages long, some are longer and are packed with practical and actionable do-it-yourself marketing techniques that have been proven to work for building a successful online business.

5. Membership Sites — this business model is extremely popular right now with many well known Internet Marketing heavyweights. Why? Unlike affiliate or product marketing where you make a one-time sale, a membership site offers you recurring income month after month. This is the closest thing to earning a regular paycheck on the Internet.

In a membership site, you can provide monthly reports on a niche topic, host a forum or offer one-on-one coaching for a flat fee each month. You can even use an affiliate program with your membership site so that other people will send new members your way.

The downside with this business model is that you need to keep providing fresh content each month to keep your members interested enough to stick around. This may be a difficult business model to follow if you are just starting out with Internet marketing.

The best resource for membership sites that I recommend is Jimmy D. Brown’s Membernaire.

In this post, I have provided a quick overview of the five basic Internet marketing business models out there. As you can see, there are pluses and minuses to every business model available online.

Take stock of your own strengths and decide what you want to get out of your online business, then pick the business model that suits you the best.

What Internet business model are you using? Share your experiences by leaving a comment.