Rob great article.

I agree going into internet marketing blind is a recipe for disaster-you really need to have both hands held for a while. I am learning internet marketing the right way on Alex Jeffreys 3.0 coaching program which I thoroughly researched before joining just so I can apply what I learn to smaller specialised niches.

I find as I learn, I write about it on my blog so it reinforces the training-after all there are a million ways to make a million bucks-its making the first dollar is the hardest. Once you find a method that works-its a case of tweeking it and repeating! kind regards Orla

Great topic, Rob.

I like NY1's point about the affiliates.

I think a lot of newbies realize, they got excited and paid $20, $200 or $2000 from a great sales letter online - and they want to get a piece of that action for themselves.

So they try to copy the guru, with their own hot sales letter to hype up how some of that money should go to the newbie.

Problem is, the legitimate gurus actually have made money online before. When you buy their $20 book, this won't be their very first $20 sale online. So their advice is based on experience. But with the newbie, the first sale of their $20 book about how to make money online will be the only $20 they've ever made online. That's not a very solid foundation for uniquely helping your customers.

The newbie skips over the guru's advice about "find a niche you already know and love."

Tomorrow, Frank Kern might offer a $500 course on how soulful music and cool video editing will make your site a best-seller. Paying for his advice on this matter would be a no-brainer, if you have $500 avaiable to invest.
And next week, Mike Filsaime might say that if you have a video about how you used to be broke, plus a pile of source code, you can get people's subscription fees to a forum. Guess what, he'd be talking from his experience.
So the following week, Joe Blow who's never sold anything onine tries to get people to pay $500 for advice about clever videos that discuss your former poverty, with cool music, to get subscribers.
Not surprisingly, not too many people want to buy Joe Blow's recycled knock-offs, so then Joe complains that the gurus are all lying scamming piles of horse hockey.

if only Joe had realized that what he knows about car repair, or air conditioning, or discount travel to the Caribbean, or gardening, or how to get a better job in the medical field, might have been an easy area to make plenty of money with the help of Frank's and Mike's tips about sales videos. Even better, Joe wouldn't have had to compete with Frank and Mike in their home turf if he pursued one of these other niches.

But that would require thinking, which sounds an awful lot like that at awful four letter word - the one with W at the start and ORK at the end.

Chris

Internet Marketing attracts people for many reasons. Some last, MANY others come and go. I think that regardless of which Guru anyone is learning methods from, no one should be taken literally. I have always said that those who succeed always develop their own strategy for success. It is much more effective to read, learn, try, and implement what ever is going to work best for us. One thing most people overlook is that when it comes to marketing, online or off, what works for some does not necessarily work for others. The same principles apply to IM and the make money online niche.

This said, I think that determining what program, process, or strategy suits our style or our business best is what is going to sell. That most people do IM in a search for overnight wealth? SURE, many dream of that. But the truth is that no one, and I mean no one becomes rich overnight with an online system, business, product or program. Or even offline. The only people that become rich overnight are those who win the lottery...

IM niche to start off is not only a mistake but rather deceiving.

I personally think its unethical to be teaching people how to make money when you haven't made money yourself.

IM niche has loads of pros but plenty of cons too. Depends on the approach. Like you have mentioned above, compartively easy to get affiliates and JV partners but then again Self Improvement, Health and Fitness and Entertainment niches are just as lucrative. Just not very active on the surface.

Maddi

Because people study this IM stuff and have no vision of their own so they just mimic what they know.

Rob-

You are a genius!

I think alot of newbies get into the IM/MMO niche because they see the demand for it, and they think they can get a piece of the pie!

But, once they get their business set up, and there sales funnel ready to go, they get to the point of actually marketing their business, and generating traffic!

Oops, here's where they run into trouble! They can't get any traffic, because of all the competition!

I love your idea of sub-niches!

Actually, I am in a sub-niche of IM/MMO myself! I am in the "make my own website" niche, and there is still quite a bit of competition, but not too much where it makes it improbable to get traffic! Also, there are alot of searches for it, which means that ranking well for these keywords will bring alot of traffic! Even though it might take a little more time, and effort to rank well in the search engines, it is still very possible!

So yes, I think a more specific niche is a great idea for a newbie wanting to make money online!

Thank you, and good luck!

Matthew Zinda

It's called fake it till you make it, only a lot of them don't make it. It's such a common mistake IMO ... newbies going right into MMO when they don't really have anything valuable to contribute to that niche. That doesn't mean that they will never have anything valuable to contribute to that niche, but they should be getting their feet wet in smaller, less competitive, but still profitable niches ...

Just as sbucciarel alludes to, you need to provide value and show that you're trustworthy. How can you give value when all you're doing is parroting a guru? There's value in being a messenger, but not when there are thousands of messengers.

Let me put it this way think of a Great white shark, if you noticed that there quite number small fishes swimming right underneath of the great whites jaw make a living out of feeding scraps from the preys that killed by great white but after some period of time later they got big and do their own hunting as well yet another small ones underneath of their mouth too! Its all about passing persistence test.

I have always thought that it's a pretty dumb idea for a beginner marketer to start by selling IM products... it's stupid...

I see this happening all the time - someone learns about IM, knows nothing, has made no money, and starts promoting money-making products....

Thus, lack of credibility... 'hey, show me the money!! How much have you made?' is what you should ask those who want to teach you...

On FaceBook I get approached by IM folks who want me to join their lists so that they can teach me how to make money online. When I ask how much they have made, most of them have not made more in their entire IM careers than I make in a day..

Point is - don't try to teach something you haven't done yourself...

Become an expert in your niche first... become successful at it... only after you have become successful in a non-IM niche, you can gain credibility to sell IM products if that's what you are drawn to....

I would not want to buy from someone who only ever sold IM products and nothing else...

and on a side note, I do all kinds of niches, but IM is the one I would not touch with a long stick...

That's just it Rob.

It's easier to follow the crowd, even if the crowd is
going in a path of destruction. Most people know
they're on that path, but stay in it out of fear of the
unknown...

"oh no, I better play it safe and stick with the MMO
market because that's about as far as I'm willing to
think outside the box".

Although the IM market is competitive it is also highly profitable. This is what lures poeple to it especially newbies.

This is a problem because the learning curve is huge. Customers, clients and subscribers will know if your new and will quickly lose respect.

I believe one should enter into a niche they are passionate about. You will naturally be able to discuss about topics easily...And you will make money eventually because you are passionate.