Obviously many people have many different ideas about how to make money online; most people that write about them have ulterior motives. I’m not an exception, but at least I’m honest and not trying to sell you something. What I have listed is the ways that people can, and do, make money on line.

1. Promote an Existing Business: This is kind of cheating, as the internet is only being used to improve an existing business however everyone worth there salt has something they already do and the odds are they can improve upon it with an online presence. Examples abound, if you can’t think of one you probably are way over thinking this. Large companies and small local business can all benefit from online marketing, the small fries can at least get themselves listed as local business in the search engines and online directories and for the big fish the sky is the limit. The internet is the most important media for those under the age of 40 (for those above it is still television with the internet closing fast) and it also holds the top position concerning where people look for business. These statistics speak for themselves; there is a lot of power in internet marketing.

2. Affiliate Marketing: A lot of money is made through affiliate marketing. Simply put, this is the practice of promoting other peoples products and services for profit. I would say that affiliate marketing is done by professional marketers, which it usually is, but many people do it “on the side” or after their day job. Some affiliate marketers make millions a month; others might pull down an extra $5 a day (that still adds up to at least a vacation each year). Types of affiliate marketing include search arbitrage, promotion of affiliate programs on web sites and the generally hated email marketers. These will all be dealt with more in future articles.

3. Traffic: Get some traffic through search engine optimization (SEO) and some quality content then monetize the traffic. Monetize is internet marketer speak for make some money off of… A.K.A. Harvest the traffic. This can be done through ads on your site or with affiliated promotions as mentioned above. Whatever you do, this can’t be a crappy site (unless you’re some sort of site mass producing spammer), be it a blog or informative niche site having good content is imperative. Internet marketers love to say content is king.

4. E-commerce: This is the buzz word of the nineteen nineties, but it is still one of the chief ways people make money online. Online stores are a dime a dozen, but the top sites in each area make money hand over fist. There are still plenty of opportunities in this area, the internet is still a very young market and it’s the wild west of the medium. Just find something you can compete in then do it better than your competition. Easy right, maybe not but you can plant a seed now that will bear fruit for many years to come. E-commerce sites sales can be augmented through eBay and Craig’s List. Crafty marketers will create a community around there sites and can leverage social media to attract customers.

5. The Dark Arts. Some make money using “black hat” SEO techniques like spamming and the creation of splogs. Although these methods aren’t illegal they are generally scorned upon. Google considers them a violation of their guidelines, but they are just guidelines from a corporation. However that corporation is the 800 pound gorilla and nobody likes a pissed guerilla. Michigan SEO Expert will not be of much help for advice in this area.

That’s the short list of how to make money online. These methods are often mixed together and have made many millionaires.