subject: Internet Marketing: 4 Business Models That Could Make Your More Wealthy [print this page] Are you struggling to make money online despite the fact that the gurus are telling you how they got rich overnight? The answer to your problems might come down to your business model. You need to pick one that's right for you and your target audience.
There are a number of different models you can choose from and each has their own advantages and disadvantages so it's important that you decide which one is right for you before you get started.
1. Product Creator
Creating your own information products puts you in complete control of your income stream. By writing a product, or hiring a ghostwriter to write on, you can set up a website and sell that product over and over again. By setting up an affiliate programme you can then recruit other people to drive traffic to your sales page and promote your product for you. You might spend a lot of time and effort creating a product that no one wants to buy.
2. Affiliate
Unlike being a product creator you don't need to spend any time or money creating a product to get into affiliate marketing. In fact you leave all the hard work of product creation and sales page testing up to someone else, all you need to do is drive targeted traffic to that sales page in order to earn commission for any product sales.
The risk with affiliate marketing is that you spend a lot of time generating traffic to the sales page and then it either doesn't convert or worst still the product creator decides to stop selling it. You can mitigate this risk though by promoting more than one product at a time.
3. Membership site
Another business model you might like to consider is to start your own membership site. Instead of making one off income from sales of your own products or from an affiliate commission you can earn an ongoing stream of income from one website.
You could provide a monthly report on a topic, or create a private forum or even offer private coaching for a monthly fee. Of course you'll need to provide fresh content each and every month or your members will stop paying.
4. eBay seller
Did you know that eBay is one of the most frequently visited sites on the internet? If you sell your products on eBay then you already have a great source of traffic. It's a strong option for a business model as its very easy to set up an online store. The only real downside is that you are relying on a third party who could change the rules at any time and have a negative impact on your business.
