Internet marketing is about promoting websites and products to the ever-increasing number of people worldwide who find online purchase of consumer goods and services cheaper, more convenient and personalized.  As a result, almost every entrepreneurial dream is now focused on this opportunity-laden industry. But many are finding out that it takes more than the ability to sell.

In conventional marketing, success is counted by the way one corners a market for a specific product.  The belief is that if you fill that market need with a satisfactory product, you’re on your way to profitability.  Not so in Internet marketing where building relationships is more important than filling a market need.  Even advertising for a website must develop these relationships and, if designed to promote a product, must be subtle and less self-serving.

Making a pitch also counts but building relationships must take precedence over the hard sale approach. This has been shown by failed projects in Internet marketing which focused their efforts on persuading prospects to buy a product now and building relationships with customers later if at all. This is the marked difference between Internet marketing and conventional marketing.

Online marketers operate in a vast media space where thousands of home-based businesses compete for exposure, opportunity and sales. Building personal relationships with prospective and existing customers is the only way to make you stand out in that crowd and pave your way to success. Advertising and marketing experts find that the behaviors and methods used in a cocktail party will reap the same results as those employed in this social media. But whereas breaking the rules of engagement in a cocktail party damages your social standing, it’s your home business that suffers if you commit mistakes in social media marketing.

The most common mistake is the tendency to flood the marketplace with messages. It’s like providing a very long list of wines in a cocktail party without inquiring beforehand about the guests’ particular choices. In the home business industry, it’s quality not quantity that counts. The water hose tactic never works for small online businesses that need personalized interaction with customers.  It’s tantamount to standing on a street corner and making a sales pitch to anyone who would care to listen.

Like this post? Subscribe to my RSS feed and get loads more!