For many, that term conjures thoughts of websites or spamming or search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing. For others, it’s all about graphical design, writing fancy code or even affiliate programs. All of those answers correct, but the essence of internet marketing is much simpler.

At its core, internet marketing is about these things:

* Understanding the target market to which the product/service/cause you’re marketing will appeal
* Determining exactly how your target market interacts with the internet
* Positioning your content on the internet to attract the attention of your target market
* Collecting information about your target market (also known as “leads”) for follow-up and conversion into sales
* Design of offers or incentives to induce the desired actions from your leads

Since there is insufficient space in this article to give all of these topics adequate attention, let’s focus on just one specific topic with the realm of internet marketing: Email Marketing.

My best payoff has always come by focusing on permission-based email marketing. Permission-based email marketing refers to the practice of collecting information (including email addresses) from website visitors and communicating with them via e-mail with their direct consent. The “permission” aspect of permission-based email marketing is what separates legitimate email marketers from the spammers that everyone despises.

My love of email marketing is strong for one reason: It works very well. Email marketing has been much like a never-ending goldmine: It enables us to produce income on demand simply by sending a good offer to our list. When you have thousands of loyal subscribers – as we do – and you put a strong and compatible offer in front of them, income becomes nearly automatic.

However, the key to successful email marketing is the development of a legitimate trust relationship with your subscribers. If you opt to send your subscribers a request for purchases every single day, they will likely tire of your badgering and cease reading your emails altogether.

Alternatively, if you take the time to provide good content to your readers on a regular and frequent basis, you’ll discover that your readers take all of your emails far more seriously, and as a result your emails will be opened, read and acted upon with greater frequency. Essentially, email marketing is really an exercise in trust.

While there are many more aspects to internet marketing than just permission-based email marketing, email has definitely been the cornerstone on which our business is built.

The truth of the matter is, that the so-called A-list bloggers, are the ones that are really pushing these worthless products. People line up to buy the crap that these bloggers feed to them each week. Can you really blame a noob for not knowing, or can you? Some people it seems purchase these worthless items because they are still looking for something magical to make them millions of dollars. That’s also the concept that many A-list bloggers put into their head. When they show the reports to their readers of their earnings, many of the readers don’t really understand that what they are being shown was established years back and is almost impossible to replicate.

This is why there are millions of results for the term make money online. So many bloggers think that they can make money by flogging the same crap that their mentors are pushing all day long. This leads to what I like to call a downward spiral. The lower on the poll that you are, the less money you make.

If you want a straightforward approach that really teaches you how to make money on the internet without all the bull and you need to check out the make money online website with a Wookie. Yes this guy has branded himself to a certain extent, but I have yet to see an angle to this blog.

Learn the real way of making money, and stop wasting your money on products that will get you nowhere.