Are You Making a Market or Serving a Market?

To many fail at Internet marketing simply because they do not match their offer to the target market.

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It is not good enough to build a list without segmenting the list by areas of interest. I have a list of people interested in fishing and do not send Internet marketing messages to that list.

It is not worth jeopardizing my fishing list relationships by trying to create a few IMs from the many who just want to know how to catch more fish.

This is also true when segmenting my fishing lists. I have a general fishing list, a salt water list, a fresh water list, and a surf fishing list. When someone gives me their contact information in return for a specific offer satisfying their specific area of interest why would I send them something completely different.

Of course, I have some who are on all my fishing lists. That is their choice, not mine. I may mention another form of fishing when promoting a product to a specific list . . . i.e. If you want to learn how to use this product when (other form) click here. The link takes them to a landing page specific to the offer. My autoresponder then puts the contact information in the designated list.

Your job, my aspiring Internet marketing friend, is to determine your audience, your offer to that audience, and how you intend serving that audience.

My friend John Chow builds his Internet business around blogging. Yes, he earns quite a lot from other IM endeavors, but his core is blogging. His followers generally start learning how to monetize their blogs from John’s site and teaching courses.

The same is true with another friend Amy Porterfield, my go-to Facebook maven. Amy’s business is teaching how to get the most from Facebook for your business. Don’t go to Amy for fishing advice. But if you want to know virtually anything about FB . . . she is the person with all the answers.

So, are you an affiliate marketer just starting out? Or are you doing IM for a while and want to know how to make more money?

Here’s are a few suggestions:

• Take a quality course and learn email marketing – It’s better to spend a few dollars on a course than waste hundreds or thousands pouring ad dollars down the drain because you do not know what you are doing.
• Get autoresponder training – learn how to properly use the autoresponder. This training is free. I use and recommend Aweber. This is an excellent service with easy-to-understand tutorials. The best part is you can start for only $1.
• Learn something about what you sell. I do not sell any product I’ve not personally used and tested.
• Make sure you agree with product provider policies and purchase terms and conditions. You may be the seller, but it is your list you are selling into. It is your reputation at stake.
•  Learn how to advertise your offers before spending any ad dollars. It is too easy to spend your way into despair . . . seeing your ad dollars dwindle with few or no sales to justify what you spent.
• Make friends in the industry. Attend live events such as Meetups in your area and seminars. Nothing beats getting to know the people succeeding at what you are trying to do. In my experience successful people share what they know and are happy to help you understand the nuances of a business.

It’s said that 10% of fisherman catch 90% of the fish. The IM success numbers are worse with 95% or so of Internet marketers never making more than $500 a year.

The purpose of business is creating customers. Then you want to keep those customers, selling them product over and over again. This is very possible when you maintain the customer/seller relationship.

Be smart and put the IM odds in your favor. Sell to the market that said they want what you offered to get them on your list.

We’ll get into cross selling another time.