If you are reading this, then you’re just one of the many people looking to make some extra money online in today’s tough economy. I can tell you from experience that you are extremely lucky because of the many tools available and so many sources of internet marketing training, some free and some you must pay for. As more and more people are getting tuned into the idea of making money online, internet marketing trends are constantly and quickly evolving. Being able to identify the trends and tap into them with an up-to-date marketing plan can really set you ahead in your business.

Here are just a few of the current hot trends:

The Economy

Today’s rough economy is the subject of many business conversations. This goes for internet marketing as well. We will continue to see recession-proof internet businesses being marketed as well as various money-saving plans, tools, clubs and forums. If you aren’t already bringing up the state of the economy in your marketing, it’s time to start.

Less Hype Marketing

For a while, one of the biggest Internet marketing trends included lots of hype. So the web was made up of one big glaringly flashy advertisement after another, each competing for your attention. It finally seems to be hitting home that flash and hype is not the way to go. While it might initially capture some interest from your target audience, you’ll need to support it with great high-value content to keep them interested. Your customers are looking for solutions to their problems – make sure that you offer these in your marketing message.

Consider looking at an online membership designed to teach you the basic concepts of internet marketing. Earn1Kaday is one such membership and they basically teach the principles of several online business models and have a very active forum of experienced members. The content at Earn1KaDay is well worth the price, however, the help offered by the established members is priceless. As the name suggests, the purpose of the membership is to help you achieve a daily goal of making “X” amount of dollars a day! Many have accomplished $1000 a day, and some make much more.

The money is NOT in the list (exactly)

Most of you have heard the saying. . .”the money is in the list” or the leads that you can generate from your marketing. This is not exactly true. Building up a huge list really won’t do you much good unless you actually interact with the people on the list. The money is in the relationships that you develop with the people on your list. Learn how to develop relationships with people by using auto-responders, participating in forums, Facebook and Twitter, etc.

If you are new to Internet Marketing then you might not be familiar with the term “building a list”, however, it’s one of the first concepts you should become familiar with because it’s one of the most important processes in internet marketing. Building a list is usually accomplished by giving something away, an ebook or software, in exchange for their email address and name. Using a service like Aweber for building a list is one of the smartest first moves any internet marketer can make. Avoid cheap solutions or self hosted autoresponders because you’ll almost never get the type of email delivery that a professional autoresponder service like Aweber will give you.

Niche Marketing

Along With the economic downturn, businesses are focusing on more and more narrow niches. This is counter-intuitive but smaller, more targeted niches will bring you more traffic than large broad ones. See Niche Profit Classroom for 2 monthly niche products along with the necessary marketing packages….without sounding hypey, NPC has been one of the most impressive online memberships I’ve found in 8 years of learning about internet marketing.

Social marketing continues to dominate

And more and more businesses are tapping into this trend. It’s been proven that adding videos to your marketing mix increases traffic to your site as well as the amount of time a person spends on your page. Along with all of the other social media tools, the use of video is increasing dramatically. Some people are intimidated by the idea of doing videos. The important thing to remember is that your potential customers want to see other real people, not some sort of corporate actor, so just be yourself and you will draw more people to you and your business.

As internet marketers we do all these things in an effort to get website traffic. Without traffic to your website all your efforts will be in vain. You won’t sell your products or build your list….it doesn’t matter how pretty your website is or how good your offer is. One of the most effective methods of getting traffic to your website is with videos, otherwise known as video marketing. One of the most effective methods of creating a rush of traffic using videos is to use the tools at Traffic Geyser, in fact if you click on that link you can try it out for $1 for 30 days. This is a service that sends your videos to 100’s of video sites, turns your video to podcasts and a other services that you’re just gonna have to check out :)

Quick customer service

If you want to maintain relationships with your customers, you must respond to their needs immediately. If you can’t, they will turn to your competitor who can.

Knowing and understanding these general Internet marketing trends and then adapting your business to keep up with them can really put you at an advantage.

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