How many of you here

Here's how I started.....

It was 1995 when I first got interested in "direct response" marketing (not Internet marketing mind you) and tried my hand at selling 900 numbers and "tracing" services. For a few years, I tread water there. I stayed afloat but made no real splash.

There was more VALUE there in the education than whatever earnings I was lucky enough to manage.

In 1998 I started to venture online with my new found DRM skills looking for ways to apply them online.

I found the process through which I'd apply these skills in something called "Beginners Central aka Cookie Cutter Marketing System". I'm sure some old timers around here like Willie Crawford may remember BC/CC. This was 1998/1999.

All went well and I ended up becoming one of their most successful students - making about 10 grand a month doing nothing but "ezine advertising" (the main traffic technique taught in BC/CC.

That ride lasted until 1999/2000 - when the FTC decided it was an uncool business model because it was "self replicating" and shut it down (the same model that got Frank Kern in hot water). Even though it got shut down, it's where I cut my teeth in IM.

After that, I did "local/offline" for clients around town and then used a series of JVs to build a mammoth "offline information marketing" empire that services medical private practitioners. That is a business I still own today and the whole thing was built up using JV agreements with advisors in my chosen spaces.

I've used a portion of my earnings from the above business to build my internet marketing and coaching businesses that I also still have today.

It took minimal capital to start my first business because I did it with JVs. What I didn't invest in capital though, I invested in TIME. Now since I have loads of capital, I buy my traffic and convert it - but it hadn't always been that way - and doesn't HAVE to be that way. It's my choice.

I started out a little over 20 years ago. I had money, but it didn't require investment back then; not initially, to get the ball rolling. Nowadays, you can get started cheaply enough, though: domain, hosting, theme, plugin.

Tom

I started five years ago without any money and no knowledge at creating websites,
and managed to build a successful game site with 5,000 daily visits.

Now most of my earnings comes for this site

ok, with all due respect. the ones that started many years ago was alot easier

Sounds like me. I started out about 10 years ago with internet marketing but never had much success because I didn't realize that having your own website makes all the difference in the world. I spent WAY too much time skipping from product to product when I wasn't making any sales. I would have to say that since joining the forum, I've learned more in a couple months than I ever did in 10 years of trying to do it all myself. It's cool to see that there are real ways to make a living online & be successful with a little hard work, dedication & using the right techniques

I started out with a bit less than $100 and no knowledge of IM at all.

I started by writing articles for others (I'd done some offline writing before). I had no idea about prices/values/marketing and started writing articles for $25 each, but quickly realised that this was an "in-between" kind of price which many people thought was "too high"(!), while others were willing to pay much more.

In my naivety, I didn't even know, at the time, that they were two distinct groups of people using "content" in two very different ways.

Anyway, the people who paid my prices and bought them kept coming back for more, so I increased the price very quickly to $50 each (my first sensible move!) and then more gradually to $75.

After a few months of that, I decided to investigate how and why my customers were using them and always wanting more, and I quickly realised that it was much better to be "the marketer" than "the writer", so I stopped writing them for other people and started learning how to use them myself. Which was how I became an "article marketer", just by being my own only customer.

I'm still doing the same thing today (and haven't written a word for anyone else for 6 years, now). And my timing was bad, because it's actually a little easier to get started in article marketing now, in 2015, than it was when I started!

When I first got going, of course, I made a whole series of mistakes because I had very little idea what I was doing. But got there in the end.

And the wisdom of Ben's point, above, about the fundamentals of marketing being unchanging and psychology-driven are actually very well illustrated by article marketing. It's a timeless business model, which existed long before the internet (some say centuries before) and can be done online, just as offline. Article directories (which have almost nothing to do with real article marketing at all) can come and go - and they do - but the fundamentals of article marketing are unchanged.


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I started out with $2 EXACTLY!

Glad i invested that, not making a full time income yet but definitely a part time guaranteed income for now.

When I very first started my payment was time....lots and lots of my time!
I didn't start spending until I got into building websites.

I started 5 years back and my investment was time ... LOTS of it ...
I had no money to invest ...

I JVed with designers and developers and thats when i had success ....
i am still running this model and its scaling very well for me

I have spent a lot of money on IM, but there are free methods I've implemented and made money on.

Zazzle and CPA. I've also made money through forum advertising and private label programs.

Although a good model is try one thing and stick to it, I don't see anything wrong with trying as many methods as possible, grow your knowledge, and find something that works for you. Most things work, I am not disputing that. But does it work for you?

Find something that does then stick to it.

For me, providing value is the only thing that has gotten people's interest for a longer period of time.

My biggest expense was time and not money starting out. I read everything I could about internet marketing, SEO and anything related to earning money online. And, yes like many I made some mistakes. That's part of the process. I didn't have $500 or anything near that to start with. Over time, I found my passion, my niche and started working in that. And, it's something that still earns very well for me today, despite Google's ups and downs and sideways moves. And, I plan on sticking to this path for a long time to come.