You've probably seen the ads. They read something like this:
"Earn $10,432 per week in your underwear!"
No, they're not advertising for underwear models. They're tapping into the endless stream of suckers hoping to strike it rich on the Internet. Let me tell you right now that the truth is that most Internet gold is fool's gold. Those "internet marketing" (marketing is not really what they do -- it's sales) so-called "gurus" make their money by making promises that they can't keep. Mark my words: Many of them will go to jail for fraud and false advertising in the next few years, and that won't be a bad thing.
The good news is that there is money to be made on the Internet, and more and more business will be transacted on the Web in years to come. To dip your pan into that stream and try your luck at coming up with some gold nuggets, you need to be ready to work, and you need to be ready to fail repeatedly until you find the thing that works. In short, you need to approach it as a real business, not as an irrevocable one-way ticket to the high life. Chances are, you'll never even make a living at it, but you can reasonably expect to make a decent second income if you know what you're doing.
What you are doing is going into the publishing or broadcasting industry. You are either publishing text or broadcasting multimedia.
If enough people find your stuff interesting, you will be able to make money. It really is that simple. How you go about doing this is not simple. It is highly complex, and you will need a guide.Even if you're running an online store, you are still a web publisher -- you're publishing a catalog just as surely as The Sears-Roebuck Co. did back in the days of yore. The copy and images that you use to sell your products are just as important as the products themselves. That's what publishing is all about -- presenting information. Do it right, and you'll make money just as sure as the sun will shine.
Web Publishing is a Business, "Internet Marketing" is a Joke