What Are The Basics?

You're so right about needing to teach the basics first
before moving on to the more advanced stuff.

The basics of Internet Marketing IMO are...

1. Effective Market Selection

Your choice of target market will determine the income
potential of your business.

Choose wrongly and you can struggle unnecessarily.
Choose well, and Internet Marketing becomes a whole
lot easier.

Choose a market that has rabid buyers who are proven
to buy products similar to the ones you want to sell or
promote as an affiliate.

2. Build a List

To be able to earn a more consistent income, you need
to build a list of prospects and customers who know,
like and trust you.

To build a list, you need to know how to at least set-up
a squeeze page, put up an opt-in form and follow-up with
subscribers via autoresponders.

Develop the relationship over time by giving your list
relevant content and offers that help them get what
they want.

3. Have Enticing Offers

To be able to make money you have to have offers that
people are will buy. These could be offers for your own
products and services, affiliate offers, etc.

You also need to learn how to sell via the written word
so developing effective copywriting skills is essential.

Learn how to select great offers and sell them effectively
with great copy.

4. Traffic Generation

Choosing a good market and having an enticing offer are
only part of the story. You need to learn how to direct
human visitors - i.e. traffic - to see and respond to your
offers.

Get good at generating traffic from a particular method and
then learn more ways to generate traffic too so you can
spread your risk and minimize over-reliance on one method.

5. Taking Action

The fortune is in the follow-up. Develop a plan to regularly
follow-up with your subscribers to turn prospects into
customers, and turn customers into repeat customers.

Internet Marketing can be relatively easy if people focus
on DOING the fundamentals rather than getting lost in the
fancy stuff and shiny objects.

People will learn and earn more by DOING than they ever
will by just study alone.

Taking action on something is often the most important step
of all.

Dedicated to mutual success,

Shaun

I strongly believe that the most important thing a newbie needs to take care of is how to handle all this new knowledge he/she is exposed to. Getting your hands on the info is easy, making it work for you and not against you is the hard part. Information overload is the easiest way to become utterly overwhelmed and eventually paralyzed.
So, in my opinion, the basis of a successful internet marketing career is to make the right decisions straight from the beginning:

1) Before buying anything do a thorough search engine research to discover the vital steps you need to take. The question you posted here would be a great start for such a research. Compare and combine the different answers you will find (through articles, videos, blog posts etc.) and make a list of the steps that are common to most of them.
2) Define your goals (be as accurate as possible here) and prioritize your steps according to your needs.
3) Make a list of the things that you feel you could do well online. It is vital to focus on your strengths rather than your weaknesses. Make sure to start from the things you really enjoy: You will not mind working endless hours on perfecting these skills, as you will be passion driven.
4) Make the most vital decision of your internet marketing venture: Promise to yourself to take immediate, massive action on everything you learn.
5) Stick to one method (as long as it feels right for you) and make it work before you move on to the next one.
6) Start gathering in well established internet marketing forums (such as the warriorforum) and be as active as you can, even as a greenest newbie in the internet marketing world.
7) Start "following" seasoned marketers that are where you want to be. Learn from them as much as you can and model their success. Feel free to contact them and start investing in their products.
8) Socializing in internet marketing forums will help you build relationships with like-minded people (mindset is huge as far as internet marketing success is concerned!) and find your future business partners: You will provide your best skills to them and they will do the same. It's a win win!
9) Do it your way! After digesting all the knowledge, methods and formulas you decide to consume, start inserting your own "tone" to things by filtering all this info through your own perspective. In other words, it's essential to discover your own voice and let others hear it. Don't hesitate testing, tweaking, combining different methods, or even reversing popular tactics in order to create your own.
10) Never give up! Arm yourself with strength and courage and commit to your success. Don't let disappointment separate you from your dreams. Believe in yourself and your special virtues. You have something everyone wants, that can eventually make our world a better place. Go ahead and bring it out!

I hope you find something that resonates with you in these 10 suggestions.
I wish you all the best!

I AGREE! That's the secret!

Your are on this planet to tell your story. The only thing anyone can give you is information.

What you really need is knowledge. And the only way to get knowledge is through you own experience.

Information combine with real life experience becomes your story. All of us have read all the books about the masters.

After you have the information (that is the easy part) that turns into knowledge then you are into the world of wisdom.

At first, learning from others appears to be the fast track to money and success but it has to turn into your story.

Money flows to people who understand it, and it flow away from people who don't. Money is an illusion. You can't find a business on the internet but you can build one if focus on yourself.

The point I'm trying to make is there is a difference between someone else's straight line and your straight line.

None of this stuff is an original idea from me because I'm not good a coming up with new ideas. But I understand, because I fell for it myself.

The only thing coaching can do is help you get lost in the moment. Having been a good athlete in High School and College I think my understanding is correct.

The basics of IM is to click with the searchers on an emotional level all the way through the process.

I just want to add this... like anything else you take the information and use it to your best interest. I don't see anything in the responses that is off the wall here.

Most of what I see is mechanical stuff. Its been my experienced that thoughts are very important to the process. Don't panic when you see something different like, the mental part of game. For me, the mechanics did not work until I got all that noise out of my head.

There are two things you have to learn:
1. How to sell
2. How to sell online

Just my 2 cents.

I ditto this...this is a great thread!