Is Internet Marketing Too Cheap For You?

Isn’t that an interesting question? Internet marketing. Too cheap.

Well, let me first explain what I mean by too cheap. You see, starting an online business is really easy because it’s sooo low cost. Like I mentioned in my earlier post, my fixed costs come up to about US$40-50 a month. Mainly on hosting, the autoresponder, and cheque clearing fees. Rest of my expenses are really miscellaneous – things like an ebook here, or a graphic there, or a domain name. I only buy those things once when they crop up.

So in all, costs are really low. Which is a great thing. However, for some people it could also be a negative factor. Why?

Because since the cost of this business is so cheap, the price of failure is also very low. That means that people can spend a few hundred bucks on getting their website up and running, and then when they don’t see results in the first 2 weeks, they say the whole thing’s a joke and then they quit.

And it’s so EASY to quit. Because they have so little invested in the business in the first place!

Compare this to a traditional business. Let’s say for example, of all things, you set up a candy store at some high-end shopping belt somewhere. What are the costs needed to set up a tiny, little candy store?

Welll, first there’s rent. Let’s say it costs $5,000 a month for rent (which is normal), and usually you have to put a 3 month deposit plus pay the first and last month of rent upfront. So that makes 5 months rent = $25,000 to the landlord. BEFORE you even sold one single lollipop. Ouch!

Then there’s the renovation. The space you rent is given to you bare and so you need to build all the shelfs, display areas, and other fixtures, etc. How much would that be? Maybe $50,000-$100,000 depending on what you do.

And then you need to buy stock. Candy. You can’t have customers walking in, paying and then wait a week for the candy to be delivered, can you? So you need candy right now! haha… so you go round to your candy suppliers and you order maybe $2,000-$5,000 worth of sweets to be put in your store.

So before you even open your candy store, you’re out $100,000-$200,000!

Is that common? Yes! Just go ask any friends you know of that started a shop somewhere and ask them how much it costs just to START-UP. I haven’t even added in the monthly expenses like utilites, staff (unless you want to be there ALL day), rental, protection money (paid to cops/gangsters… haha!) , etc. That’s $5,000-$10,000 a month in expenses alone. How much candy do you need to sell just to breakeven?

Now if you invested $100,000 into starting up a shop and knowing you had $5,000 in expenses you had to cover every month, would you work your ass off to make sure your business succeeds? Damn sure you will! Because the price of failure is so high! It’d would be silly to spend that much money and then not match it with the same amount of hard work.

The cost is a motivating factor that pushes you everyday to succeed! Because if you don’t, it gets even more painful! If you decide to quit, you still have to pay the balance of rent based on your contractual terms, you need to spend money to have contractors restore the space back to it’s original form, and you still have stock left unsold. Quitting becomes very expensive as well. I don’t know about you, but if I had all of this hanging over my head, I’ll be working my ass off!

Now I don’t want to sound as if having high cost is a good thing. It’s not. I’d rather have ZERO cost any day! It’s just that it definitely can motivate someone to want to succeed badly. But you shouldn’t have to need high costs or something else like that to motivate you to succeed.

Why not be motivated ‘naturally’ and have the luxury of having low business costs? Like an online business. You could still make as much revenue as a traditional business but with lower money and time expense. My fixed costs are $50 a month and I don’t need to stare at the computer all the day long. I work when I feel like working. It’s perfect! Please don’t get me wrong, there’s still lots of hard work involved but there’s a lot more flexibility allowed.

So if you’re not motivated to do what it takes to succeed online, do you really want to have to face crushing expenses every month just to get your ass moving? I’d rather you not. See the low cost as an advantage that you have to help you succeed even FASTER.

Don’t use it as an excuse to justify why you can ‘take it easy’ with your online business, because that isn’t going to help you one bit. I’m not a millionaire guru, I come from the trenches like you and I’m speaking from experience. So make the most of your opportunities and create the results you deserve.

Oh yeah…

I just want to say that if my rant has made it seem like candy/retail stores are a business death trap, I have a friend whose relative makes tens of millions every year selling candy. So there…

Out.