They might be interested in humor books, or other appliances. She would have these items for sale on her website. But also, she would join affiliate programs for humor books and appliances and place those on her website.

Then she could put another link in her listing that says something like:

"For more information on my free ebook and item for sale, please see my 'About Me' page" (hyperlinked to About Me page)

Her 'About Me' page would have a link to her website where she will entice them to subscribe to her newsletter. Whenever she has a new product, she could announce it in her newsletter.

Create a Custom About Me page http://www.AboutMyAuctions.com

PayPal: Don't ask, just do it! This is bridge to jump off if all your friends are doing it. PayPal is number 1 online payment acceptance company on internet. Especially through eBay, almost everyone uses it and allows it for payment of an auction. Not only that, but PayPal allows you to add your website in their "PayPal Shops" area for free. I get at least 100 hits to my website a week from PayPal. No, that's not highest number, but it's completely free advertising. That's 100 people seeing and hopefully joining my website that would of otherwise never found me.

Open a PayPal Account Now (Free) http://www.paypal.com

ClickBank.com ClickBank is for people who want to sell other peoples products and also for YOU to sell your product when you're ready and have one for sale. For now, we'll concentrate on becoming an affiliate for others.

When people create a digital product, such as software or ebooks that they want to sell, they want to recruit other people to sell it for them. So they will offer a commission to those people for promoting and selling product. This allows YOU to fill your website with things to sell, without having to own product, track sales or ship it. Now, this is good ONLY if you stay within theme of your website and stay away from banners! Please do not throw up a bunch of affiliate links that have nothing to do with each other. It will not work!

ClickBank handles payment process of digital products. So you can go through ClickBank and find products you want to offer for sale and place these affiliate links onto your site. When people click these links, if they purchase product, ClickBank completely handles transaction and mails you a check twice a month.

Open a ClickBank Account for Free http://clickbank.com/signup.cgi?r=cidiconosa

Buy your Domain name and open a Hosting Account If you are dead set on going free route on this one, please stop reading now, I cannot help you. Free website/Free Hosting=Unprofessional nightmare, Pop-Ups, unreliability, and no control over your site. I cannot stress importance over this. If you are determined to be a success on internet, you need your own website.

Depending on type of site you want, your monthly fees will vary. Usually between $14.95-$49.95 per month.

Two great companies for this are Small Hosting Plans and Mini Website Maker. They cater to small and home based businesses and give you everything you need.. A domain name, hosting account, website template, customized business logo, shopping cart, website editing program where you can make changes to your website through web browser and free technical support.

If not Small Hosting Plans, be sure to ask your hosting service if you are on a Unix or Windows server and if you are allowed databases. These are important.

http://www.SmallHostingPlans.com

http://www.MiniWebsiteMaker.com

Gather necessary software (In my hyperlinked version, there are links to free software for items below)

Web Site Design Software Image Editor Word Processor eBook Creator Email Program with Auto-responder capabilities

Create a website with free resources and an opt-in subscriber list

Here's where your creative mind comes in handy. If you do not know how to create a website, it is imperative you learn. Yes, you could pay someone to make a site for you, however, to be successful, you must be constantly updating site, adding affiliate links as you join, etc… and you cannot depend on someone else to be updating your site for you. You must become fully involved in whole process. The more you can do for yourself, less expensive this whole thing will be.

Again, I recommend Mini Website Maker, http://www.miniwebsitemaker.com

Write articles yourself. Review other products, ebooks, etc and add your affiliate link to article.

Put an opt-in subscribe button on every page of your website. Gathering people's email addresses is one of most valuable tools. It may not seem like much at first, a name here, and email there… but it is an integral part of your newsletter campaign later on. You may want to password protect a tempting portion of your website until person adds themselves to your subscriber list. Or offer a freebie if they subscribe, like an ebook or contest entry.

Join affiliate programs that match your theme

Join affiliate programs that compliment your sites contents. Don't put links to office supply products if your website is about entertainment. There are SO MANY affiliate programs you can join, it's silly to waste space on things that are not relevant to your site. If someone came to your site because you offer free jokes and comics, do you really think they are going to veer off and purchase some copier paper simply because you have a link to it.

DO NOT PUT AFFILIATE BANNERS ON YOUR SITE. Repeat that 3 times, memorize it. Banners do NOT work. At least not like people think they would. Even without statistic to prove it, I can tell you personally that I cannot stand to visit a website only to have an annoying flashing banner drawing my eyes away from what I'm trying to read. I don't EVER click a banner, I simply scroll page to where banner is not visible to me anymore.

This Getting Started Article is in 4 parts. This is Part 1 of 4 To view Parts 2, 3 and 4 please do an Author search on Go Articles for Natalie Williams The full, hyperlinked version of this article can be found at http://www.GettingStartedOnline.com

Intro There is an enormous amount of information out there about "How to Succeed online". Most of information is really good. However, it is long…. Very long. I've subscribed to so many 'email courses' and was excited when they first appeared I my inbox. I would read every word. Now, I delete messages before I even open them, because I just can't take so much information anymore. I have brain-overload. There's point when good information becomes too much information. You just don't need ALL of that to be a success.

Now that I am educating people on how to succeed online, I have taken all my information and knowledge, condensed it down and created a simple, step-by-step guide to get you up and running. I am personally doing everything in this ebook and will show you one way I make my living online.

This type of business is for those who:

-want to work from home -do not want to do "Sales calls" or have too much person-to-person contact -do not want to have to ship anything -are fairly well-versed in ways of a computer or are very willing to learn -have a lot of time to devote to their business and are willing to actually work! -would like a nice sized, steady income for doing something enjoyable

This type of business is NOT for those who:

-want someone else to do all their work -want to watch television while "Thousands of dollars" roll into their bank account -don't know how to turn on a computer and don't want to learn -are expecting to be a millionaire in a month, or even a year

There really are endless ways to make money on internet. You could open an online store, sell on auctions, sell some type of service (web design, secretarial, etc).. and each way has its' own long learning process.

This guide is zeroing in on one particular way. Through your own website, ebooks and affiliate accounts. I began my whole online venture in August 2002. I decided I wanted to sell on eBay and wrote a journal all along way detailing every experience, ever licensing procedure and every contact with wholesalers and drop-shippers. I turned that journal into an ebook and sold hundreds of copies through eBay. Everyone who purchased it raved about it for honesty and details. I had many request for second edition. I hadn't planned on a second edition…heck, I didn't even plan on first one, it just happened. I am a confirmed journal-aholic. I have written in journals since my youth, so keeping a journal of what I was doing was not out of ordinary. After seeing ebooks sold all over eBay, I created mine and it was best decision I ever made.

Anyway, with requests for a second edition, I decided to create a whole website dedicated to assisting people who wanted to sell online. I'm very big on researching and through months, I learned a great deal on business licensing, selling online, etc… So, Online Sellers Association was born.

The time came where I grew weary of packing, shipping and eBay tracking. I decided to try and succeed without having to ship anything. Realizing that my ebook sold quite well and I never had to ship it, just email it, I decided to look into ebook sales.

This research led me to "Affiliate accounts", 2-tier, ClickBank and on and on. I now know it is completely possible to make a living online with digital products.

Here is truth… IT IS WORK!! All these ads that promise you riches through selling ebooks while you sit back and money automatically rolls into your account are highly inaccurate.

I have worked harder than I ever have, my children complained, my marriage went through a rocky time and my house was a mess (okay, so it would have been a mess anyway, but I like to blame it on my business)…. However, I will say honestly that if you work hard, follow my guidelines and use your creative mind, there will absolutely come a time when you can relax, take a vacation and allow your sales to process automatically. I began my whole online selling experience on August 29, 2002 and as of today, September 2004, I am extremely happy with my progress and am getting more successful everyday.

I have sorted through mountains of information, affiliate accounts, ebooks galore and am now creating this very condensed version to assist people in jumping over mess and get right to point.

There are many ways to do most of this for free, however, when it's time to pay for something, I speak out and will explain why.

I am giving you a "checklist" of what you should do to accomplish goals, and I suggest you do go through it all, because I am not adding hype in this book. There will not be any parts you can just skip over.

Very Short Version: Here is what you will do to generate income from your free website. I am going to show you how to do most of this absolutely free. All it will cost is hard work from you.

1) Decide on a website theme. 2) Join affiliate programs that compliment your theme. 3) Create a free website filled with this information, affiliate links, articles, message boards, etc.. Gather visitors email addresses in one of two ways. a) Make your site free, but only accessible if they register b) Make your site freely available to public, but entice visitors to give their email address to receive a free ebook or other incentive. 4) Create a free ebook, also with your affiliate links, preferably an ebook that people can re-brand. Give this ebook away everywhere. 5) List auctions with added links to your ebook, website, about me page, etc.. 6) Promote everything on message boards, your website, newsletters, etc. 7) Create and send out a newsletter on a regular basis and in time, sell advertising space in your newsletter.