First, you will NOT make money online without good old-fashioned hard work. Don’t believe any site telling you different. If you’re going to quit your job and devote your time to building your online business (or even go at it part-time while you keep your 9 to 5) you’re not going to want to waste your time and money with “get rich quick” schemes.

So you need to watch out for them. If a site promises you “$x,xxx income in [any amount of time] without any work on your part!” Or something else absurd like that, forget it. Don’t bother reading the rest of the sales letter; just leave. If the owner really knew how to make $x,xxx/hour, they wouldn’t be telling you, now would they? Wait, I take that back. They do know how to make $x,xxx/hour, and it’s by sucking you into their scheme and making you pay them for shady information on how you can make $x,xxx/hour.

You MUST have a web site to be successful online. Why? Because without it, there is nowhere for you to collect and give out information, sell products, create your email list, or basically do anything but email people. And it’s hard to build credibility from just an email – most people will dismiss it before it gets opened, because they have no idea who you are.

Websites also allow you to brand your business. Branding, basically, is the act of making yourself, your business, your product, or something well known. For example, Pepsi is a “brand name” because Pepsico, Inc., marketed the hell out of it when they started. Could they have created such a huge company without branding? No. A website will help you establish your brand, and thus the worth of your products.

Your website will also give you your own piece of Internet real estate. Your website is much like your house, apartment, or condo. It has an address, called your domain name, and people can come visit whenever they like, if they know about you. But, instead of your address being 123 Anystreet, etc., it can be anything you want, so long as nobody else has taken it. I own quite a few domain names for the various projects and products that I have.

While we’re on the topic of branding, I want to stress that you should NOT use your ISP email or any other free email address for business purposes. If you’re not using the email address(es) that came with your web site, you’re doing yourself a great injustice. You’re missing out on the chance to add that much more awareness to your brand. Think about it, why would you tell people to email you@aol.com instead of you@yourdomain.com? It’s unprofessional, and some people will choose not to work with you because of it. And there’s always the Spam issue. If you use your personal email address for business purposes, eventually you will begin to receive spam, and you don’t want to get a bunch of spam at your personal address, do you?