Information overload - It's killing this newbie! :(

I totally understand you.
Just pick up 1 method and work really hard on it. There are a lot people making money from those method that you mention, like Facebook, Cpa, article marketing, etc, but they mastered it and you have to do that to be able to make any money from them.
Success

The turning point will probably be when you stop looking for other people to tell you what business you should be in and find something you're passionate about that you can use IM for.

IM is like a tool bag - you can fill it with lots of cool stuff, but until you know what the job is - they're irrelevant and you can't tell which ones to use.

Fortunately for me, I didn't stumble upon the Warrior Forum in my 'newbie' stage. I was already making money when I joined the forum. I didn't even know the forum existed before that.

I'd advice you to pick one thing, learn it and then work on it like there's no tomorrow. In that time, you might as well take a short leave from this forum. It'll help you really concentrate on what you're doing and when you start getting results, you can scale it up.

Best of luck!

If that single sperm from which you were born was discouraged and bogged down by the millions other sperms surrounding it, you wouldn't be here today. You gotta want it hard enough.

Hi Jeff,

I second El Mundo's advice. Pick one strategy and bust your tail at implementing it until you become successful with it. Spend little time with other methods because the scatter shot, try many things at once approach divides your power.

Write a contract with pen and paper that you will stick to mastering 1 method over a set period of time. Perhaps 2 - 3 months. Maybe you won't master it but experimenting with article marketing, blogging, etc over that stretch of time you will cause you to become more comfortable with the method. What's more important your mind will be focused on a specific end, lending it more power.

From the feel of your post you have become a little frustrated. We've all been there. I suggest to sharpen your mental tools. Scour the web for personal development books, blogs, etc. Considering investing in a program. When your mind is strong everything else falls into place.

Ryan

Can I assume you are into gaming? If you are here are some stats to consider:

The average game player is 35 years old and has been playing games for 13 years.

Forty percent of all game players are women. In fact, women over the age of 18 represent a significantly greater portion of the game-playing population (33 percent) than boys age 17 or younger (18 percent).

Sixty-five percent of American households play computer or video games.

190 million households will use a next-generation video game console in 2012.

80% of an expected 190 million households, 148 million households, with next generation video game consoles will have this console connected to the Internet.
SOURCE: GrabStats.com

My 10 year old son is getting me very interested in video gaming and the scope of the industry is very wide.

If you are a PS/PS3 or XBox guy start your blog on the format you prefer. Write reviews on the games and some of the new hardware/accessories.

Some trends my son and I are watching are the launch of Kinect for Xbox 360 and PlayStation Move.

The sale of used games is making GameStop a lot of money. Near where I live in south Florida there are about 10 GameStop stores within 7 miles of home. Can you get your hand on some used games and offer them for sale?

The hardware or accessories for game sell very well on Amazon. Writing reviews for some of these can be very profitable.

Send me an email if you are interested in making money with Amazon reviews. Also check out this link for extensive coverage of the subject: Making Money with Amazon

You may have to focus on some of the lesser sections of the industry since of are saturated. There are sub-section of the wide niche that you can profit from.

Go for it.

I agree with the handful of people who said to pick ONE thing and focus on it. However, I would like to add one caveat that I did not see mentioned...

Just because you choose one opportunity and work hard at it, that does not guarantee success. You might succeed, but if you don't succeed then you should strive to "fail as fast as possible". That way you can move on to something else.

This is particularly applicable to your fear of choosing a niche. With proper niche research (along with a business plan, etc.), you can greatly increase your chances of success. But if it fails, then what? It's OK. You can try another one!

The point is to stick with it long enough to know whether it's a success or not. You don't want to be a quitter and bail out too soon. But you also don't want to waste your time on a losing venture. Instead, cut your losses and move on to your next idea.

Instead of looking for business opportunties (especially "turn-key" ones like GDI, and others designed to build someone else's business--not your own), I would encourage you to focus your learning efforts on how to build your OWN business.

As far as what type of business model to choose... there's a lot of possibilities. Since you mention promoting CPA offers... I will just say that that particular business model is certainly viable, but not best-suited for everyone IMO. It's best for someone who is good with numbers, is a creative marketer, and has some capital to risk on paid traffic.

I think one of the major contributors to the information overload syndrome is the fact that unlike the collegiate environment; (where there's a whole lot more to learn); there's no structured learning curriculum in the IM arena.

Sure, there are a few courses made available; but they're not economically structured to meet the burden of educating the masses. Over 90% of newbies enter the IM arena with little to no operating capital.

That being understood; try structuring your own curriculum based on your chosen direction. Learn each aspect one step at a time and attempt to master it as much as possible before moving on to the next.

It may take you longer than you expected, but ask yourself... are you in this for the long haul or do you just wanna make a quick buck?

PLP

Pick one thing that interests you, read about it until your knowledge levels are higher than most people's, then package up that info and sell it to them. It saves them time and you get to write about stuff that you like.

Consider for example article marketing, do you want to write a ton of articles? Will you get satisfaction outsourcing that writing or will it make it an empty experience?

You said it yourself ... you haven't found your niche. You have a little knowledge about everything but have perfected nothing. Comes a point when you have to decide on the route you're going to take and filter out the rest and perfect the plan you've chosen.

Hey Jeff,

I think most of us have been where you are now. Like others have said, you have to stick with one method. A lot of marketers fail because they jump ship before it ever sets out to sea.

One thing that I did notice throughout your posts is your own self defeating attitude. "WoW is too saturdated, ezinarticles looks overcrowded". You are painting yourself into a corner before you ever actually do anything with it. How do you know you won't make money with the WoW niche? How do you know you won't make money from article marketing? Other people are making money. This is not a ZERO SUM game. There is plenty of money for everyone, it's just a matter of working harder than your competition.

When I was in your position I picked on tactic: good ol' fashioned SEO. Free search traffic and then I put my nose to the grind stone and worked on on page and off page SEO and all the bells and whistles that goes with that. I am working with amazon right now, but the thing is, I've learned how to drive traffic, so now I can replace amazon with anything.

Pick your game and stick to it. And stop defeating yourself before you've even begun.

A lot of this is a mental game too. Remember, there is enough money to be earned by everyone, NOW GO GRAB YOURS!

Hi Jeff,
You can make money with CPA networks without a website, but it's really costly... but it can be done threw PPC campaigns but my suggestions is to get your self some cheap hosting to drive traffic to your CPA offers. It seem that you like to write anyway, as alot smart guys on this thread suggested choose one niche and learn everything that niche or that offer and drive traffic to it. IM is a business and should be treated that way, you have the blue print for that in your hands right now, you also know that you need a product( "I mean you really your own product" ) and a list, that the true way of making money on-line, the profits are 100% your. A product you own, that also grow a list... with your list you drive laser focused traffic to your sites and offers from CPA networks, Affiliate programs and JVs that you join from that niche you chose..... the one you spent time on learning and it will be the one that pays off at the end of the day !

Hi Jeff,

I can totally relate to your situation and that was me a few months back.

There has been some really good advice given in the comments and I would like to add the one thing that really got it going for me.

I got a mentor/coach and the investment was very significant amount for me - note I said "investment" not expense.

The very first thing we did was to go back to basics and get organized. I had way too much information, ebooks, plr etc. etc. but I had no focus!

So I sat down with a pen and paper and spent an entire weekend brain dumping everything I wanted to achieve in 3 areas: business (what I really wanted to achieve this year - be realistic and include $'s); entrepreneurial (what I need to learn to achieve this business plan) and personal (what I want to do with my family when I start getting success - this one is critical to me as it drove my other 2 achievement goal areas)

Then I looked at all the points I had written down and created my plan.
Firstly it was a 1 year plan but if you cannot do this then at least create a 90 day plan (for business, entrepreneurial and personal)

Following this I wrote down all the tasks necessary to achieve these objectives and spent a bit of time putting priorities on these tasks - also consider if there are some you can outsource, especially if they are too technical for you.

Next with this long list of tasks then I now had in priority order, I broke my yearly plan into 4 90 day plans - then again into monthly and weekly plans and finally into daily tasks. Even then with my daily tasks I prioritized again with the most urgent being the first task.

So I knew exactly what and why I was doing the very next day - my info overload had disappeared and I had real focus for the first time.

I also kept a brief record of exactly what i spent my time on each day - as a check to see if I was "cheating my system" - this keeps me productive and continually checks my focus. So I planned for an end result and just worked backwards to find out what I needed to do TODAY.

Hope this helps mate and good luck

For me this allowed me to keep focus only on the things that make money like building my list and building a relationship with my list. Plan tomorrow today makes life for me a lot less stressful and the actual planning was fun to do, especially now as I am seeing the results of focusing on the key tasks each day.

This is in addition to the great advise that Peter mentioned above:

I dealt with info overload
a long time ago by being somewhat organized and structured.
Think of this as a college class where you only
had one lesson at a time.
Create a module (folder) containing info for each subject.

You may just come up with your own system
but like Peter mentioned it's easier to be focused if your organized.

"Focus on one thing" strategy I remember has worked for me when I decided to already implement what Yaro Starak has taught in his Membership Site Mastermind and here I come, I have established Mass Outsource Mastermind 6 months later. Also, I decided to pull in stuff in the outsourcing niche since I've learned so much about it during my "hiring" stages when I plan to free up things for myself and take the challenge of building a passive income business online with the help of these virtual staff. Fortunately, I've reused and refined all the knowledge and materials that I've gone through since I started outsourcing my business tasks and from there, I have studied my systems and tada, started a course!

I admit I've had couple of mistakes where I really sucked at it at the start but still, what worked for me is the passion to help people who have been in the same stage as mine and eventually face all the risks without hesitation. I know right from the start I already have the ample knowledge to market my business but without finally facing it and taking action, I wouldn't be where I am right now.

To be successful in Internet Marketing, you should start eliminating these fears off and start doing what you love. Don't care if you'll be earning at the start and just do what you know would be effective. Once you receive that first bucks, that is the time where you have to look at where your strengths are, develop it and then aim higher to earn more. There's no harm in trying, remember that.

I hope this helps on your motivation.

Dilbert is one of my favorite cartoons. It is so often "real life." Being afraid to skip the "newest and best" is how you end up like the pointy-haired boss...


Paul

Hey dude

Well, I think I can help you: What made me go from earning almost nothing to becoming self-employed working from home was switching offers and stop reading.

All I do now is UK finance/travel lead generation as the margins are so much higher (£90 / lead) for a simple name+telephone number. It blows anything out the water, really.

If you want to do it, you need to focus on offers where the margins are higher ... no point doing $1.00 email submits ... nobody is getting rich off that.

Any questions just let me know

Nick

The turning point for me was to stop buying the typical make 1000s in days type information and any crap regarding loopholes. I now concentrate on the basics which always work.

Find a niche
build a site
give loads of info
market the site - seo,article directories,bookmarking,linkbuilding etc
build a list
sell products related to niche.

Rinse and repeat

I can absolutely understand you Jeff.

You see, until you make your first sales, you can't be sure whatever you is you do is right.. No amount of posts on a board will make you feel like it's working like some nice sales in your account

However, a lot of guys here are giving you the right advice, which works everywhere, not only in internet marketing, and that is - stick to one thing, and make it work for you.

Imagine, that if Jimmy Hendrix decided to drop guitar after couple of months, and pick up a tuba, then a flute, and then a piano. Probably we would've never heard of him..

Jeff,

If you cannot see any potential success with your interests, go at it from an entirely different angle. Look for what niche IS doing well. Of course, it will help if it is something you enjoy, but it doesn't have to be. Perhaps the enjoyment will be in the form of making money, rather than having fun.

Do a thorough search through places like ClickBank, eBay, Amazon and other such sites and see what's actually selling. Check out Google Trends for ideas. Look at CB Trends and CBEngine (I think it's called) to see what's doing well.

Once you have a hot niche chosen, start using what you know to market it. Take one method, give it sufficient time and effort to see if that method will work and then, move on to another method and do the same.

The FIRST key to making money is having a hot niche that is 'hot' but not overwhelmed. The competition might be too tough in some general niches, so look for micro-niches inside them. In other words, don't choose Betting. Choose one specific betting niche.

Stop believing those sales pages that boast that they made 1,000,000 in a month, because those high successes (even if they do exist) are extremely rare and definitely are not the norm. Accept that it takes time to work up to the big pay cheques. Accept that you might only make $200 in your first 2 months.

The SECOND key is to stick to one niche, rather than picking several at a time. Stick to one method of marketing at a time. Get that one method working before trying more.

The THIRD key is to persevere and be patient. Don't expect to hit the jackpot in 3 months. It can take considerably longer. Persist with the niche and the marketing long enough to give your efforts a chance to pay off. Some marketing methods don't work that fast. It takes time for them to work through the system.

Article marketing, for example, is good for getting a few sales in the short term, but it takes time for those articles to circulate and become popular with Google. That requires more effort on your part to promote those articles.

Even a blog takes consistent work before it becomes so popular that Google automatically comes back to it on a regular basis to see what's new.

That's how to proceed from here.

Sylvia

Start simple, don't try to go overboard and take in everything


Start with researching what CPA products are, now research what networks are, research what merchants are, etc, now research how affiliates fit into this.

Now research methods affiliates use, pick one and research that further, etc, etc

About the WoW market, it is saturated because there are a lot of hungry obsessed people in that market. The question is can you find a place there. If you are a serious or active player you can make connections with lots of others and you can find out and share their frustrations and problems. You should be able to figure out some way to offer solutions to these problems.

If you started a blog and wrote a lot of original posts from your experience, sought places to guest post, commented regularly in related forums and blogs, then did everything possible to get people in that community on a list where you could continue to build a relationship you would probably do pretty well.

If you have any budget for advertising use it to drive people to a squeeze page to get them on your list. You can add some offers on your thank you or download page. Of course you will need to come up with something to incentive them to join your list; something that solves a problem they have.

In the WOW market there are the obvious products but there are always connected markets. Maybe what they really want to buy is a software that somehow makes it look like they are not actually playing WoW while they are at work or ways to not have a sore back or blurry vision from sitting at the computer until 4 AM, again.

The hardest part is starting off. Just try and stuck into a particular method and keep at it, there is where most people fall, they give up to easily. To be successful you need to work at it, make no mistake it is hard work but once you hit it big it is oh so worth it.

I'd recommend joining Wealthy Affiliate. Some people say bad things about it but it's honestly better than anything out there in my opinion