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Probably the best piece of advice I will ever give you....

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Published: 20Jan2005
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Let's face it, setting up a website business is pretty easy when you compare it to, say, opening a shop or restaurant or other 'offline' business. It doesn't cost a lot of money and if you are prepared to learn, you will probably be able to do most of the work yourself. Even if you prefer to hire people to do the work, you can do this very cheaply by using one of the many 'freelance' sites that exist exactly for this purpose.

With this in mind, probably the best piece of advice I will ever give you in relation to your Internet business is this:

'When you are making money with a website, keep your mouth shut!'

In other words, don't go telling everyone about your site and how much you are earning. Don't share this information with your 'friends' on the forums you visit each day, don't tell your friends in the offline world, don't tell anyone that you can't trust 100%.

Why?

Because the world is full of copycats - people that cannot come up with their own original ideas but who are happy to rip off other people's ideas for their own financial benefit.

Now of course, this happens in the offline world too but far more work and money is involved in opening a new restaurant just down the road from another similar business that is already doing well. Even if you could be bothered with the work and could afford to do it, you would still have to face your competitor every single day knowing that you have basically done something that could have had a huge impact on that person's income and the quality of life enjoyed by their family. Most people would not want to be in that situation.

Online this isn't the case. It costs next to nothing to throw up a new site and it is unlikely that you will ever have to face the competitor that you have ripped off.

This means that people do it all the time, so I repeat my comment above, if you have a business online that is making money, keep it to yourself.

Now of course, I am guilty of breaking my own rule in some respects - to the left of this sentence is an advertisement that states a monthly income which is available for everyone to read. This is because there are exceptions to the rule....

Part of my own income is generated from the Internet marketing industry and the competitiveness of this industry means that to have any chance of success, you must already have achieved a degree of success in other areas online. Often, the mark of success is the level of income your businesses are generating.

Here's the thing though, I own several online businesses that no one in the Internet marketing industry knows about and they generate just as much income for me as my 'public' businesses. Some of my closest friends don't know about these websites!

These sites quietly generate income and several are in completely untapped markets with little/no competition. If I were to reveal the markets, I would be flooded with competition in hours.

I am not alone - most successful Internet marketers keep their cards close to their chests - why wouldn't they? It is daft to start shouting about what is making you money as this simply tempts the copycats out and into the game. Making a success of any business is hard enough but to invite competition is crazy!

If at some point you decide you want to venture into the Internet marketing 'how to' industry then do as I have done and make a couple of your sites high profile but keep the big money earners a secret.

Which brings me to another point - a lot of people first try to make money online in the Internet marketing arena and this is a big mistake. This is an incredibly competitive area and there is just as much money to be made in other markets and most of the time it is, quite simply, a heck of a lot easier....

Think about it, in the Internet marketing industry you are usually pitching to other people that have a much higher awareness of sales techniques than 'normal' people. You are used to pop ups, autoresponders, newsletter lists, free ebooks etc and know that they are all designed to get you to spend money. Thing is though it works but how much better would it work in an industry where the customers don't have the same level of awareness? I can tell you - a LOT better :-)

Richard Grady has been helping ordinary people earn online since 1998. He writes a free newsletter which is published every two weeks. To subscribe (and claim your free gifts), visit: http://www.thetraderonline.com/newsletter.html

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