This low-cost program ($50) consists of an extensive online marketing training manual. EXPECT to learn a LOT in a very short period of time from this program.

My very first foray into internet marketing was with Cookie Cutter in April 1999. The Newbie Guide was created by the founder of Cookie Cutter and is kind of a grown-up version of the original Cookie Cutter. With Cookie Cutter I learned a lot very quickly. I credit it, in fact, with my creating and running the AHBBO website at all. Without Cookie Cutter I would have spent MONTHS learning what I learned in only a few days. Quite frankly, I doubt I would have persevered otherwise. The Newbie Guide is even bigger and even better. So, if you're looking to learn as much as you can in as short a period of time as possible, this will be the best $50 you've ever spent.

Note: if you intend to use The Newbie Guide as an income-generator in addition to a training resource, you will need to invest another $100 or so to get set up with credit/check processors and your own website. You can resell The Newbie Guide to others for $49.95.

Caution: This product is being recommended to you as a training resource, NOT an income generator. Unless you already have a high-traffic site, do NOT expect to make a lot of money reselling the Newbie Guide.

 
NEXT STEPS

Once you've absorbed the information in The Newbie Guide, you'll be ready to start an online business of your own. Be sure to get the foundation of your business right from the start. That means creating a website with quality content that will attract repeat traffic. You CANNOT skimp on this. If your site is little more than a series of links and banners to all the many and varied affiliate programs you signed up for immediately after reading the The Newbie Guide manual, YOU WILL FAIL. Making money from your website requires that you attract large numbers of repeat, targeted visitors. Research has shown that only 2% - 3% of site visitors will take any step at all towards making a purchase from you. Not a sale, mind you, just a step towards a sale, such as sending for a free report or clicking on a link. Of that 2% - 3%, only 2% - 3% of THEM will actually go on and purchase from you.

As you can see from these statistics, making money with your website is simply a numbers game. The only way to make significant money is to attract large numbers of targeted prospects and keep them coming back often enough that they will be exposed to your message at least seven times (the average number of times a prospect needs to be exposed to your message before acting). And the ONLY way to attract repeat traffic is to give your visitors something worthwhile to keep coming back FOR.

An online business is not for the faint-hearted. It requires a REAL commitment and hard work on your part. It takes real EFFORT to create a website with content so worthwhile that people will return, time and again. So accept that fact at the outset and decide whether you really are prepared to do what it's going to take.

Against that background, here are a few EXCELLENT resources that I recommend for the next stage of creating your own online business.

Your website must be designed with your site visitor in mind. Forget the bells and whistles and focus on your CONTENT.

Make Your Site Sell!, by Ken Evoy, M.D. is THE authoritative source for everything you need to know to design a website that SELLS. And it's dirt cheap. Sells for something like $17. It's massive and brilliant and will be your bible for everything you ever do with your website.

There are plenty of free online tutorials for novices dealing with how to create a website. Here are just a few to get you started:

A Beginner's Guide to HTML

How to Write HTML Files

A Practical Guide to HTML Publishing and Resources

Idiot's Guide to Creating a Homepage

HTML Quick Reference

Bare Bones Guide to HTML

In addition to these resources, I recommend Elizabeth Castro's book, HTML For the World Wide Web. You can order it online from Peachpit Press. It's a great get-started-quick guide for beginner and intermediate level website designers.

Once you grasp the fundamentals of HTML coding, you can short-cut the process by using an HTML editor. These typically contain many time-saving functions that make hard coding your pages a breeze. The program I use is LiquidFX. It's shareware and comes with a 20 day full-function evaluation period. If you decide to buy after the evaluation period, it's $65. You can get it at http://www.psylon.com.

From a practical point of view, the hardest part about starting an online business is deciding what it is you're going to sell from your website.

Your two basic choices are (1) to promote affiliate programs and/or (2) to create and sell your own products.

Affiliate programs are an excellent choice when you're just starting out. For information about what an affiliate program actually is and how to choose the best ones for YOUR business, read Affiliate Programs ... A Not THAT Easy Start To Your Own Online Business.

Beyond a certain point, however, you're going to want to move beyond affiliate programs as a means of making money from your website. After all, when you're promoting affiliate programs, you're working on commission. The lion's share of the profit goes to the owner of the product. So you should aim, in the medium term, to create your own products for sale so YOU can keep the profits and enlist an army of affiliates to sell your product for YOU.

OK, but what to sell? I hear you ask. INFORMATION. That's why people are coming online every day in droves. They're hungry for information. About ANYTHING. The market is so vast that, no matter what subject you decide to focus on, there is a viable market for it.

Let's start with information that's already been created for you. This can also be a good way of developing the all-important content you need to generate repeat traffic to your site.

My absolute favorite resource is Allen Says' Internet Marketing Warriors site. Membership to this secret site is a one-time only membership fee of around $50. The affiliate program pays $30 a sale too so, depending on the subject matter of your site, this can be a good addition to your affiliate program portfolio. You must be a member to participate in the affiliate program.

At the Internet Marketing Warriors site you'll be able to download hundreds of free reports with full reprint and resell rights, as well as ebooks for resale. You also have access to many other ebooks and tools (such as autoresponder scripts) for your own personal use. This is by far the best value and most comprehensive site of its kind I have come across. Many of the internet's big name old-timers are members.

Now, let's turn to creating your own information product from scratch. Ken Evoy's done it again (see Make Your Site Sell! discussed above), this time with Make Your Knowledge Sell!. In Make Your Knowledge Sell!, Ken teams up with Monique Harris (of SellYourBrainFood.com fame) to create a resource equal to Make Your Site Sell! but this time focusing on taking your own knowledge and life experience and turning it into information products that you can sell from your site.

For links to even more great programs and resources for home-based and/or online business entrepreneurs, visit the AHBBO Links page.