If you have an online business, or you’re thinking about starting one, then you run across a lot of Internet Marketing products and services.

The problem most people have is: how to know what to buy, and when to buy it – or not.

There are some issues with low-quality products, or misrepresentation, but fortunately almost every Internet Marketing product comes with a quality guarantee and the option to get a refund if you’re not pleased with the product.

Plus, I’ll assume that you’re a smart cookie and a fairly good judge of character…

A healthy dose of skepticism is a good thing. It will make you do your research, Google the product name and the merchant, read the fine print, make note of those quality guarantees, and ask your peers for feedback. All of this should go into a smart buying decision.

The bigger issue is that most people buy products they don’t necessarily need, which is a different monkey altogether. In addition to being skeptical of the product or the merchant, we should also be ’skeptical’ of our reason for buying.

So how do you know what to buy, and when to buy it?

The Buying Filter

Once you’ve done all of the necessary research, and you feel this is a legitimate product at a fair price, you still have one more element of the buying decision to consider:

Is this product right for me?

My advice has always been to only buy a product that you need right now, to accomplish your current objective. The buying filter is simple:

Will this product take me closer to my goal, or distract me from it?

It’s easy to buy up products that we think we will use in the future, especially when we are taunted by a “limited time offer” or a “buy now or you’ll miss out and regret it forever”. But keep in mind that this is your business, and you are the only one that knows for sure if a product is a match for your goals.

There is a difference between investing in your business… and buying a product. And if you’re not investing in your business, all you’re doing is investing in the sellers business.

Always use the filter, and invest in your business growth wisely. Know what you need, why you need it, and WHEN you need it. Otherwise you’ll end up with a hard drive full of info-products that you never read or use, and a bad taste in your mouth that keeps you from buying the products you do need.

Best,

p.s. If you’re not sure what you need, or you need help making a buying decision, you are welcome to ask at my discussion forum. I check in there several times a day and would be happy to give you an objective opinion. You can also view a list of guides I personally use to run my own online business on this page.

Think it’s the lack of advanced techniques that’s been holding you back?

Think your blog isn’t finding readers because you don’t have the coolest plugins? Or that your sales page doesn’t convert because you couldn’t afford the 1,999 Secrets of Ninja Marketing Masters product that got released last month?

Think the secret to successful marketing and running a profitable online business is some piece of Jedi mastery that you would need to study for years to learn?

Not even close.

Most businesses (online and off) just get the basics wrong.

So here’s what works. Get these right and you’ll be ahead of 98% of your competition.

And if you’re just getting started, you’re in luck, because you don’t have a lot of bad habits to unlearn.

Describe benefits, not features

I know you’re rolling your eyes. This gets covered on the first page of Marketing for Blithering Idiots, but we don’t do it.

We get wrapped up in what we do, and we forget to translate that into what our customers get out of it.

The insanely simple and direct way to handle this is just to put a bulleted list on your sales page (or About page or Hire Us page, wherever it’s relevant) under the title:

Here’s What [My Product] Will Do For You

List out the seven most important wonderful things that your customer will experience as a result of doing business with you. Make sure this list can be seen “above the fold” on the screen — in other words, without the viewer needing to scroll.

Make them a nice mix of logical and emotional benefits.

Benefits are the little black dress of marketing: always appropriate. Try tucking them into your headlines, or writing entire blog posts around key benefits.

Don’t forget that testimonials and case studies are a great way to show benefits rather than just telling people about them.

Make your advertising too valuable to throw away

I got this from copywriting legend Gary Bencivenga, and it’s even more applicable today than it was when he used it. Since he made millions of dollars as one of the most successful copywriters in history, I pay special attention to what he has to say.

Advertising is, almost by definition, junk. Direct mail, infomercials, billboards — we see these as garbage, even though they do sometimes influence us to buy.

Bencivenga instead positioned his direct mail advertising as valuable content. He perfected the art of the “magalog” — a commercial mail piece that looks like a magazine. His magalogs contained valuable stock tips, health information, or expert financial advice.

Many of the products Bencivenga promoted were early versions of information products — specifically, books and newsletters. He didn’t pull the “B” material from those books and newsletters to give away in his marketing. He found the very best tips, the juiciest and most beneficial advice, and sent it to prospects for free.

Sound familiar?

(What can I say, I only steal from the best.)

Bencivenga’s technique works perfectly with content and email marketing. The more genuine value you create in your marketing materials (which includes your blog, your Twitter stream, and your forum posts), the tighter relationship you build with your customers.

Address objections

It’s hard to keep your cool when you create a business. You put so much work and care into it, the idea that anyone doesn’t love it as much as you do can be hard to fathom.

You need to get over this.

Most people who see your marketing messages won’t buy from you. But many of those would buy from you, if not for some unanswered question in their minds.

Objections are all the reasons prospects think your product might not be for them.

Objections boil down to fear — fear of feeling dumb, fear of making a mistake, fear of wasting money. Give your copy enough time to address those fears and overcome them.

And one super-secret technique

OK, this one really is a ninja trick. Check out this Copyblogger post on the sneaky, ultra-advanced sales technique that most marketers miss.

But shhhh, don’t tell anyone. Otherwise any newbie could do it.

About the Author: Sonia Simone is Senior Editor of Copyblogger and the founder of Remarkable Communication.

Are you familiar with the late comedian Mitch Hedberg? Very funny man, taken from us far too soon.

More on him in a minute.

But first I want to say that there are a lot of good internet marketers out there — people who have a ton of integrity and who produce excellent material. These people aren’t scammers.

They understand that if they produce questionable content, word will get around and they’ll be out of business. These people have put their hearts and souls into their products and give their very best to their customers.

Yet I know for a fact that the honest ones will tell you that their products will not make you rich. Hell, I have a course of my own, and I’ll tell you right on the sales page it’s not going to make you rich.

Someone has to say this. Someone has to write it down in black and white and repeat it enough times so that it sinks in — and when I say “sinks in,” I mean that it has to go down deep.

Like to your soul, or at least to that burrito you ate for lunch.

There’s Nothing That Will Make You Rich

No thing will make you rich.

There is not one thing out there that will turn you from rags to riches. There is not a single thing that you can pick up off a shelf and pay for that will perform internet alchemy on your behalf, turning online lead into gold.

If you’re looking for a magic bullet, it doesn’t exist. If you’ve just cashed in your 401k to buy XYZ SuperCourse and aren’t worried because XYZ SuperCourse is guaranteed to return 500% of what you paid within a week, then guess what? You may well be screwed.

I’m sorry to be so incredibly obvious. I wouldn’t do so if I felt I was saying something that everyone already knew, but statistics show that only around ten percent of people who buy a book read past the first chapter. Around the same percentage of people who purchase an internet marketing product or course actually use it.

Again, apologies for the obvious, but that means around 90 percent of people who buy a course apparently figured it was going to drop fairy dust onto them from where it was sitting on the shelf.

Internalize this fact all the way down to that burrito: Nothing will make you rich.

The Mitch Hedberg Guide to Real-World Success

The only force with the power to make you rich — or to even make you one red cent — is YOU.

• You will do what it takes or will not.
• You will develop the quality and personality and credibility and gusto needed to succeed or you won’t.
• You will want it badly enough and persevere enough and have acuity enough to figure out if you’re on the right path… or you won’t.

So right now, you’re reading this and probably thinking, “Great. This post is of zero help. It’s the Jehovah’s Witnesses of posts, where my success or failure is predetermined and nothing can change that.” But that’s not true.

Let’s get back to Mitch Hedberg.

Mitch has a joke that goes, “I bought a jump rope — but man, that thing’s just a rope. You have to do the jump part yourself.”

• Buying a jump rope and expecting it to make you fit is like buying an info product and expecting it to make you rich.
• Using that jump rope for a few minutes a day is like picking through an info product, reading it slowly, and doing a few things here and there, getting mixed results.
• Using that jump rope for hours on end every single day because you’re so incredibly determined to get really, really good at it? Using it doggedly, passionately — almost angrily — because you are so determined to master it?

Well, that’s how this happens.

You Have To Do The Jump Part Yourself

Maybe Buddy Lee, the guy jumping rope in that video, is an anomaly. In the same way, maybe Darren Rowse, who makes well over six figures blogging, is an anomaly.

Or maybe Buddy and Darren were just lucky (not).

Do you think that at the outset, Buddy Lee bought a really spectacular jump rope that allowed him to instantly do what he does? Do you think Darren Rowse started from nothing, bought a course, and suddenly started raking in a healthy six figures with Digital Photography School?

No. Because no thing made them successful.

I mentioned at the outset that I’ve created a course and that my online friends have created courses and products. None of these things are useless. Far from it, in fact. A carpenter who works hard can build a house, but one who has the right tools and knows how to use them can do it a hell of a lot faster.

• Will the things you learn in Naomi Dunford’s Online Business School improve your business? Yes, after you give it your all and refuse to quit.
• Will Dave Navarro’s ebook launch course help you to produce a blockbuster launch? Yes, if you’ve created a great enough product, culled a large and motivated enough following, and work it, work it, work it.
• Will my inappropriately-titled course help you set up your site, your mailing list, your cart, your affiliate program, and generally all of the nuts and bolts of your online business? Yes, if you take the time, do the work, and follow my instructions.

But will any of the above make you rich? No. Online business courses are like Mitch Hedberg’s rope. In the end, it’s ultimately up to you to jump it.

Now get jumping.

P.S. If you buy Naomi or Dave’s stuff, I’m donating the affiliate commissions to Copyblogger… I hear Brian’s hurting for money (not).

About the Author: Johnny B. Truant is the creator of Make the Internet Your B*tch: A ridiculously simple guide to turning your online business from tech headache to profit center — which, by the way, will help you immensely but will not make you rich.