How did YOU do it? How did you earn your first $1

Found a group of people with a need. Found a product that addressed that need. Joined the affiliate program. Reviewed the product and provided an affiliate link to it.

That was 12 years ago and the same thing still works now.

How everyone makes a $ in the world.

Find a buyer that wants what you are offering.
Sell it to them in a presentable way.
Good post-sale customer service

Repeat...

These are the basics but if you remember to always keep it in your head when it comes to the 'method' online things will be clear.

First of all, you should come up with high quality content that people wants to read. Try to update it regularly so that you will have a following. You can consider outsourcing the content creation part if you run out of idea.

The money making part will come out automatically when you're into the topic that you blog about & offer some solution to common problems that you and your readers share. Just my opinion

I made sure that I had a desired niche, and when that site was up and running I posted it EVERYWHERE.

From reddit, stumbleupon, discussions, forums, etc.

I made a 5 dollar through sweepstakes...that's my first motivation.

I made my first $ from ebay then adsense and now mostly amazon. When the hurdles come around is when you need to work even harder. Once you see the results from your consistent efforts the motivation sky rockets. At least it does for me.

I'll be happy to tell you what I did. I'm not sure that it would be nearly as effective now as it was then.

This was back in 2006 or so. I had tried to make money online for about 6 months. Didn't make a dime. Finally, I had the idea to try to sell what was already selling! So, I went to Amazon, looked at the top selling products, built a WordPress site to sell one of these product types, and loaded up a few handwritten product descriptions with pictures and links back to Amazon.

Of course, I had no traffic! So, I started doing article marketing. I wrote a hundred or so articles where the bio box linked back to my site. This worked big time! My first sale happened within a couple of weeks. Also, I built a stream of income that resulted in me making probably $3k or so per year since just off of this one site. Unfortunately, the last two Google slaps killed this particular site.

I wouldn't suggest using Amazon, today. (Check out what happened in California.) I also don't think article marketing will work nearly as well now as it did then. But the principle is the same! Find a hungry market and figure out how to serve it.

Hope that helps give you some direction.

Lee

Mine as an actually weird story. Back a few years ago I was a member on one of those sites where you were collecting credits to get traffic to your website, and I sold a couple thousand for around $30. It was nice at the time though.

I made my first $27 about 2 years ago.

Signed up as an affiliate for a top selling Clickbank product, found a keyword with 3000 exact searches per month, saw that the .net domain was available and bought it. Stuck up a simple Wordpress blog and started writing articles which I posted on the blog and Ezinearticles. I started submitting articles to other article directories for backlinks and within 3 weeks or so my site was on Google page 1, which was when my first sale came in.

Simple works best. Do the basics well and consistently, then build on your success.

Wow there are some great stories here about how people got past some of the difficulties and worked out how to make money online.

Its also great to see so many different ways to achieve this! Obviously perseverance is important here so well done to everyone who is making money!

My first cheque came from Clickbank after about two weeks of work and I earned it through the bum marketing method. I literally just followed the steps. The cheques haven't stopped coming. Now I'm scaling it up with more paid websites and I google every question I have or I come to the Warrior forum and search for answers in various threads. The thing is I fell into IM. I wasn't looking to become an IMter but I got hooked after I saw the first cheque. That's my retirement fund.

Simple affiliate site using article marketing, and then quickly segued into providing content for others.

i Earned my first buck through adsense.

Mine was less creative than some of the talented warriors here but mine was a simple case of ebay.

I then worked out that I was onto something that was in high demand at a reasonable price that was shipped from Australia and not from china hong kong etc.

So once I had made some money with old items from the house I imported lots of this item and marked it up 200% and the ebay buyers love it.

I also then took some of the items to the markets and handed out flyers each time I sold an item that had my ebay store info on it and customers were excelent at refering friends and collegues etc to us.

I enjoy it when I get emails and phone calls to say how happy they are.

I LOVE my ebay store and don't tell anyone but I would do it for free if I could afford to as I enjoy it so much

i put together 10 blogs 30 squid lenses 20 blogger blogs built a big link wheel book marked it all and made some money from click bank and adsense, it was a start to build on

Started out with Ebay, a venture with my mom. We sold stuff that my aunt gave when she moved out of her house and went overseas. We made quite a lot in the first 6 months. Now it's not moving.

Had a blog with Adsense advertisements on it. Then in the middle of it, my adsense stats are showing weird signs and high conversions which lead to the suspension of my account. Till today I still don't know what happened to the click rates.

I also have a personal blog with some advertisements but i don't intend on making much with that.

Then I tried PTC, which is exorbitantly super duper slow moving. Now I have like $3 plus in one and $1 plus in another. Sort of time wasting as well.

Now i'm looking into affiliating. Just set up a blog for it using Killer Content hopefully it'll work.

I started on eBay. Sold portable DVD players when they were first hitting the scene. Did pretty good but didn't like selling on eBay so ventured into affiliate marketing. I still do affiliate marketing and I have also created a few products of my own.

Fiverr! You can offer many services.

A mix of adsense and offering my writing service on fiverr to begin with. Great way to start for me as it raised a bit of cash to put straight back into backlink services for my sites.

Found something I know things about, applied the knowledge to running a website about it, and presented things in a way customers can easily find what they need. Then I just worked to get traffic to it and started making money.

Nick,

Just remember, every time you see a hurdle, it's a signal that success is nearby.

People only guard what is worth stealing.

You don't see alarm systems at the local dump, but you sure see them at the bank.

Patrick

I made it through freelance writing. Back then, I wrote mainly for content creation companies rather than private clients. If I knew then what I know now....

My first money came from clickbank. Later I used Amazon and my own product. These can all take tiome to build up. The thing is - don't give up! Find a need and a way to sell a solution to that need and you will make money. Just keep at it.

As for helpful sites - without a doubt: www.tiffanydow.com

How I made money

- started with adsense for 1 month -- got it to 5-10p a day -- unsuccessful

- Went to affiliate products ie amazon for 1 month -- sold nothing -- unsuccessful

- Went to clickbank for 3 months -- made $90ish a month -- unsuccessful, IM SUCKS

- Did nothing for 2 months -- $24 made from previous set ups -- Why do I bother

- Started cpa stuff ie CPA Lead and other cpa stuff for 1 months-- made around $50 a day with a lot of work -- unsuccussful, as after I stopped working on it the profits dropped straight down to around $10 a day,

---> I made a website before I started clickbank, just for fun as a punt to see if the thing would rank,... months later much to my suprise it was getting alot of hits, because it came top of google for alot of niche key words. I wrote an ebook on the subject (outsourced most of it) and put it for sale on the website,

This website gets around 1000 uniques a day and generates around $200 a day, I didnt touch the website for 7 months (i was busy) and it still makes this amount -----------------------Successful

I made my first sale from a Commission junction product called Gamefly. I posted lots of ads in craigslist and got a sale or two. Now I enjoy marketing software and make a bit more now. I also have a niche site for a keyword that I'm building links for. In a few months I should be making good money of these sites. After I get the links that I've worked hard it will pay off.
Find some thing that you like and there is a demand for...then find some buyer keywords that are easy to rank for and keep pounding to get contextual links (the word you want rank for hidden with your link) For example forum poster below in my signature is a word that I want to rank for. If my keyword research is correct with the software that I use it should be easy to rank for. It will have to be the best and most relevant in (Googles eyes) for that keyword. Then you will make it.
I use a service called SEO linkvine. It was designed by Brad Callen. It is a article syndication service. In other words you article is put on other blogs that want content and you get the links. It is not old news that regular article marketing to places such as Ezinearticles is a dying method and slow. The links look better when they are spread out on blogs.
Plus I use Squidoo and Hubpages. To get links to my site. I also ping the pages that I produce and bookmark them plus share them on twitter and Facebook. Then I take and run a few ads on Craigslist and Backpage just to mix it up.
Then I go and write on these forums and try to get some feedback and possibly have someone sign up on my list. Then I send out useful emails via Aweber to the people on my list to keep them interested. After I get more (500 at least) I will venture into swaps and contests to get even more people on my list.
Then it's back to writing more content for the syndication service. Then It starts over again and don't forget to reply to people and keep an interest about the products you promote.
I suppose this is the reason most people fail online. It's not for the faint of heart. It's for a die-hard.

First dollar was earnt by getting subscribers and emailing them cool stuff.

Kind of aka frank kern style, come across friendly and not spamming.

Then hit them with an offer, I was extatic when the first monies came though!

But I can say now with a very large email list, a whole new world has opened up, and many offer come and email marketing is the most powerful thing in the world IF DONE RIGHT that is

Wow, been a long time. Let's see. I started the first podcast show in the dating niche for men. From there I started a membership site based on this show and my advice that I was giving to men.

Then I had a collection of my past shows which I began to sell:

Past Shows | Player Supremes Past Shows Of Raw Game Lessons!

Then some jack*** named Rumi got a hold of my shows and uploaded them somewhere on the net and was making some of the available to those online nerds the PUA's or pick up artist.

So I said F*** it, and began to charge for access to my site. I charged $5.00 back then and still do today.

From there I wrote my first ebook called how to conquer your fear of women.

Then I wrote my famed 7 steps to becoming a player:

Seduction Guide For Men

Then I wrote my book on female mind seduction. The I developed my videos on Plenty Of Fish Pimping

Online Dating Profile|Online Dating Profiles| How to create POWERFUL online dating profiles

Oh I forgot I developed some videos on basic internet dating before that and how to create hypnotic profiles which I now use as a bonus for my plenty of fish pimping product.

I also wrote my book on how to meet women in a nightclub

Nightclub Seduction Techniques

I also have several other products that I cannot recall right now.

It's been a blast and I've done almost 1,000 shows on youtube:

ThePlayerSupremeshow's Channel
Oh I forgot my confidence program:

Sales Page Template #1

and my dance program as I used to teach hip hop classes and dance classes:

Http://nightclubdancing.info

In fact my video on youtube has over 1 MILLION views


And no you cannot leach off my video...before some bozo asks.

I recall when I sold my first book the excitement of people actually buying my advice. I had never sold my advice for money before.

And the sales of my book 7 steps still goes on today.

It is now a 7 day program instead of a ebook with the audio version and some other podcast shows loaded into it.

I always over deliver on my products and under charger for what I do.

A bad habit that I need to break. It must have something to do with self belief or something like that.

My first $1 comes from Freelancer job. Through Hostgator Affiliate i got $50 i made my friend to signup under me. lol

email marketing using aweber is my best monitising so far

Nick this is a GOOD question.
When I start online my 1st step was to
build a list and doing affiliate marketing.

This was my start and I'm still doing aff
2 min ago I send an email to my list.

I don't make much money in the IM niche. What other niches are you working in? If you haven't made your first $1 online then I am unsure of what you have to offer as far as internet marketing advice.

How did I do it? How did I make my first money online? I worked while other people were sleeping or having fun on the weekends. I focused on one thing and did it over and over and over and over again until I became good at it and found success.

How bad do you want it?

Viral is Good, Virus is not.
Love your niche, create content for that niche.
Optimize urls,titles,descriptions,keywords(for Yahoo and Bing),and use proper headings (H1,H2,H3 etc.) let the ads flow within the content.
Offer affiliate products and/or services related to that niche where sales equal commissions. Maybe a few strategically placed text link ads from Google Adsense, Adbrite etc. - There are many ways to make money online - I made my first dollar online in 2001 - I make 3-5 figs. a month now. It can be done. (Don't do it illegally )
Payout!

The way that I first made money was when I was like 13, online... I made a whopping $2,500 from a product launch. I got traffic by making a squidoo page. lol

I launched my site and joined the forum here within a few days of the launch. I made my first money not from the site itself, but from doing work for another Warrior in the members seeking Warriors for hire sub-forum. That was within a day of joining.

My site hasn't made a nickel yet (two weeks since launch) but monetizing it has been the lowest rung on the "things to do list" and something I've admittedly neglected. I launched with a Blogger template and a niche idea, and a lot of work ahead. I've gotten a lot done, but the things to do on it outnumber the hours in a day (though I do as many of them every day as I can - no days off with this) while doing some outsourcing for seed money.

That goes all back into IM. So far its only been spent on picking up a .info domain for a sister site to develop, but there are other things I'll be spending it on too: hosting for the new domain, a membership here to get all the 20 year perks for a 1 time fee, and then some outsourcing beginning with my biggest weakness: graphic design. After that, whatever is the most bang for the buck for increasing traffic through paid back links and posts, site reviews, lists, etc. By then it may be earning money (at least one of the sites). If not then more work is still needed :p

I dunno how helpful that is. I guess my reply is one part philosophy, one part an idea (outsourcing for cash) and ways to spend it to build traffic to then profit from. *shrug*

I found that offering one service lead to clients asking for products that are related to that service and becoming great money makers. You could use your site as a listing site (services) or a link building product or use it for adsense.

I have started my earning on odesk, and my first $ came from facebook likes project.

I started earning my first bucks through clickbank simply promoting weight loss products to friends, and then things expanded from there.

I did some keyword research, some SEO and put Adsense on my site. In the next week I earned 5$.

."Build a relationship" with your list goes the mantra from marketing experts. Save your efforts and do not bother trying to guess what they want.

I made my first dollar online through Amazon affiliate site within 7 days of site creation with some back linking.

Most of the advice you see here is basically saying the same thing. Find a need and develop or offer a product or service which meets it. Learn techniques to help you to promote your website or blog which addresses this need. And find ways to monetize this need through affiliate links or sales of a product or service related to th is need.

However you do this can vary greatly but that's essentially how it's done. Good luck!

My website isn't yet monetized but we have gotten some money through member donations. Though since we don't use the money for personal means it isn't "profit" but we have earned money through it for the website's continuing maintenance and operation. More important then the day we earned our first dollar was the day that the site paid for all of its own bills.

well, I have a website business, and this is what i do normally do

1) Find a profitable niche.
2) Build a one page website about that niche.
3) Build a list by generating traffic to that list.
4) promote related products to that list.

My first $1 online was from Tv Show site (Gossip Girl) site was soo lame and made on .yolasite.com but.. 1$ was made =P