Hey there readers!

If you’ve read my previous post, you’ll know that I’m fed up with the whole ‘make money online’ niche.  It’s become harder than ever to even make a buck online.  Crazy enough, I remember when making more than $200 a day was not uncommon for me.   Now, I find it difficult to even break  $1K a month.

I’ve had to pull out all stops, and even do things I truly didn’t want to do, like release websites that I wasn’t ready to put out, buying ads in certain places, staying up til 3 or 4AM writing up a report to help boost my mailing list or even make sales.

None of it works anymore…sad to say.  Internet marketing has truly gone down the tubes, and I truly blame the U.S. for it.

How can I make such a bold statement?  Easy…it’s all on the feedback of my mailing list subscribers.

Normally, I post articles and relay helpful information to people.  None of it translates into sales anymore like it used to, and I truly believe that those who are still ‘bum marketing’ or article marketing are truly going to suffer.

But here’s some of the comments and concerns I’ve received from my own subscribers…

“I wish I could buy what you mentioned in your article…but I can’t afford it”

“I have overdue bills and credit cards”

“I’ll have to wait until my tax refund comes in”

“Can you just give it to me for free? I can’t afford the $7″

These are the comments I truly get from my subscribers, and it has me really weary for the future of the ‘make money online’ niche.  Crazy enough, all these comments come from my subscribers based in the U.S.   I have customers in the U.K., India, Singapore, Africa, Canada, everywhere!  But a majority of my subscribers are naturally from my home country, the U.S.

With so much nonsense happening here in the U.S. with subprime mortgages, people not being able to afford the ‘basics’ of life anymore…it’s reflected in the turnout to my promotions, and it’s really disheartening.  I don’t promote a bunch of ‘get rich quick’ products, but only stuff that I’ve read and truly recommend to my online entrepreneurs who are trying to strive for success.  I’d rather not damage my reputation by promotion a scam-like product.

Man, I can remember back in 2005 when I first got started doing this stuff.  Next month, in April, it marks three years that I’ve been marketing online.  Sad to say, my first taste of success wasn’t until almost a year ago.  I remember, the economy was still trash, but not trash enough to the point where I couldn’t get by.  Even with all my hard work, I was still making some money, but not enough to write home about.  It helped me get by, and not it barely does.

Nowadays, with the advent of so many ‘giveaways’ and people trying to copy off of Frank Kern’s Mass Control launch, it seems like no one pays for anything anymore.  Everyone wants it for free, and now my own subscribers don’t wanna pay for nothing either.

I look at my own career, and noticed that I did pay for a lot of stuff, but in the end it’s all helped me.  And if it didn’t help me, I got a refund, simple as that.  Now, people don’t even wanna take that risk anymore.  The top businesspeople in the world took risks when they started their business, and most even suffered huge failures along the way.  Of course, they became learning experiences for their next project.

But, it’s just the state of the U.S. Economy that’s really shaking stuff up here for us online marketers in the U.S.

The question is…should we now target all of our promotions to those outside of the U.S.?  Is the United States a “dead zone” for promotions?

C’mon…it’s truly evident that Americans aren’t buying anything anymore, online and offline.  How do I know?  Why not ask President Bush why he’s giving our citizen’s spending cash to spend in June?  Even the government knows how bad things are here to the point where they’ll sacrifice the value of the U.S. Dollar so that they can print up more money to hand out to people to ultimately spend in the stores.

I think you and I both know, that Americans aren’t going to be spending this money in stores to boost the economy like the goverment suggests we do.  I know people are going to be using that $300-$1200 check to pay off bills, debt, and take care of what’s important (like family) rather than blow it on something that we’re probably only going to use once, and then get a refund on it anyway.

It should’ve been a ‘wake up call’ for internet marketers in the U.S. when the government wanted to give us money to ‘put back into the economy’.  This should’ve told you that Americans aren’t buying anything anymore.  Have you noticed that U.S. business’ earnings for the last quarter have all dropped?  I think the only company in the U.S. that actually turned a profit last year was Wal-Mart, and that was by a small 2-3% from what I heard on the news.

If the ‘broke man’s store’ like Wal-Mart is barely seeing increases, and Wal-Mart is where the poor people and cheapskates shop, this should show that even the lowest prices in the world still can’t get people to buy.

I’ve even noticed myself cutting corners here in my household.  Eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for breakfast lunch and dinner on occasion for me and the children…buying kool-aid mix instead of buying actual juice and drinks…paying off certain bills and leaving others for the next and just deal with the late fees later…yeah it’s hard!

In my last post, I mentioned how I’ll be exploring other niches instead of this ‘make money online’ niche.  To be honest, if you really wanna find where the money is online…it’s not in the ‘make money online’ niche anymore…it’s in the ‘keep my money’ niche.

People are no longer looking for a way to get rich quick.  They’re looking for a way to stay alive, period…and hopes, dreams and wishes are no longer being bought into.

I remember when The Rich Jerk and other ‘get rich quick’ books were the top of Clickbank.com

Now, I’ve noticed, they all have taken a backseat to other niches that are actually helping people with their financial situations.  I think one of the top products on Clickbank was a piece of software that finds promising penny stocks called MARL.  Crazy enough, I checked it out, and I think it’s crap…but everyone is buying into it, because every ‘make money online’ book is disappointing people more than ever before.

Back in the day, someone would buy a ‘make money online’ book just to see how they can make some extra money.  Now, more and more people are buying these books and literally praying and relying on them to help them get by in life.  It’s no longer about just making some extra money to live a better life.  Now, people are buying these same guides because they’re not trying to make extra money…but rather actually MAKE MONEY…PERIOD.

And when these guides aren’t making any money for these guys, they get HOT, they get PISSED, and they’re damn near ready to sue you for not saving their life.  The entire mentality behind IM really sucks now.  I know we’ve all heard that cliche “95% of internet marketers fail”.  Well, I think that figure is up to 99.99% now.  The only people who are truly prospering online are those who have been doing it way before the slip in the U.S.’ economic future.  And if you haven’t been doing it before the start of the recession, they the only way you can prosper in this niche is to literally ‘ride the coat tails of someone successful’.

All these new people that pop up with products that get heavily promoted by others, they’re riding the coat tails of someone else.  And we all see the same people over and over again with product after product.  No one news has anything to offer.  And if someone new does come around…it’s because they’re either longtime pals of a ‘guru’ or they probably won some contest being help by an internet marketer where they promised to JV with you for being a winner in their stupid contest.

2008 is going to be a real dismal year for internet marketing in my opinion.  A recession in the U.S. is afoot, and for us Americans in the online marketing game who have a list of mostly Americans, it’s gonna hurt us big time in the wallet.  The only way American internet marketers can overcome the financial drama here in the U.S. is to do one of two things…

1) Invest your money in foreign currency and metals and let it sit there for a while.  Other countries’ currencies aren’t declining or taking hits like the U.S. Dollar has.  And notice…the price of Gold in the U.S. is only going up…that’s because the Dollar is going down, down, down thanks to the government.  Seriously, I wish I would’ve taken my friend’s advice and put a ton of my money into Gold and other currencies.

2) Start targeting your market for those outside of the U.S.  People in the U.S. aren’t buying anything anymore, because they can’t afford it anymore.  So why promote to Americans?  I’ve found myself shifting my promotions to attract more foreign website visitors rather than Americans.  I’ve found myself posting my ads on Craigslist in other countries instead of posting in U.S. folders.

And every small biz ad on Craigslist is for what?  Loans and financial assistance.  My ads used to get cluttered up amongst all the loan brokers and mortgage specialists on there.  That must be the niche for the U.S. this year…financial help.

Maybe myself and other Americans should be focusing on not teaching people how to make money, but rather put our attention in actually helping people better manage their money and get them on the path to financial prosperity, without the use of Google Adwords and Google Adsense, and Clickbank and Paypal.

To be honest, if someone were to teach me how to properly safeguard my cash and make it grow instead of how to ‘make money online’ I’d probably dump my entire next Clickbank check on it in a heartbeat.

Americans are trying to get out of a recession, not dig ourselves a bigger hole for this recession.

Sorry for the long rant, but I think it’s needed for any man, woman and child who’s in the internet marketing field.  Yes, I said ‘child’ because sad to say, I’ve seen more and more kids (like still in Jr. High) who are now doing this after they get out of school.  Are their parents that strapped for cash that they kids have to do affiliate marketing to help their parents get by in life.  WOW.

These are just a few things you should really put some thought into.  Do you really wanna do internet marketing anymore?  If you do…good.  I wish you nothing but success.  But you won’t find me trying to ‘make people rich’ anymore.  Why?  This might sound dumb but…people aren’t trying to ‘get rich quick’ anymore!  They’re just trying to get by for Christ’s sake!

I know this for a fact.  I’ve had tons of people unsubscribe from my list not because of my emails, but because they’ve lost faith in IM…and more and more people are losing their faith in it quick, and are simply getting refunds for anything they’ve purchased (hurting marketer’s wallets), and are putting more and more time into that full-time job they have.

The whole ‘be your own boss’ idea is dead.  People don’t wanna be bosses, they wanna survive.  What good is it to strive to be a boss, when you loved ones are suffering from the lack of income in the process of your journey to be the ‘online guru’?

Just some food for thought.  You can catch me actually promoting things that people NEED and not what people WANT.

Good luck to you,

T.M. Harris