HOW TO USE ONLINE FORUMS TO MAKE MONEY FROM INTERNET OR AFFILIATE MARKETING

Online forums are electronic boards on the internet. Individual users post messages, comments, questions and other forms of data on these boards from different parts of the world for people to see and meet minds together. Messages that appear on the boards are arranged in topics or categories. To be part of an online forum (also called internet forums), simply log onto their website and signup. Your e-mail address is usually required for you to signup and post messages. Visitors or non-members can only view the messages and comments; they cannot post their own messages or comments.

In other words an online forum is a virtual community of like-minded people, who meet from time to time to meet minds together, share ideas and opinions, discuss issues, ask and answer questions, and much more.

As an internet marketer the benefits of online forums to you are so many. Online forums provide the platform for you to market and promote your own products or affiliate products for FREE at no extra cost! They also provide the medium for you to make sales without having to meet people face-to-face. Better yet, all online forums are usually open 24 hours daily which gives you the flexibility to promote your internet identity or products at any particular point in time.

As a “Beginner internet’ Marketer” online forums give you the opportunity to sell or promote products and services without expending your hard earned money on advertisement. They also provide a platform for you to test peoples’ acceptability of your product or service.

Below you will find the strategies or tips of using online forums to make money without getting your fingers burnt.
• Tip 1 – Find at least 2 or 3 forums on your niche, particularly those with large membership base and high Page Ranks (PR) on search engines like Google; and sign up with them.

• Tip 2 – After signing up or registering with them, set up your signature line which is where you will put your name and links. You will need to make good use of your signature. You can place a link within the signature portion of your profile. Your signature gets shown in each post you make; hence if viewers of your post pick interest in what you have posted, they may click on your link to get to your site or blog, or affiliate website.

• Tip 3 – Now that you have joined a couple of forums or more, take your time to go through different posts. At the end of the whole thing you should be able to come up with some questions frequently asked by the forum members or some pressing problems facing some members of the forums.

• Tip 4 – Nothing sells like the solutions to the needs of group of people; so settle down to prepare sincere answers (solution) to these questions or problems, preferably in the form of a simple report or write-up. Make sure this report proffers solutions to their problems or adequately answers their questions. The report can be prepared on a Notepad file or MS word file or using the free editor Note Tab Light at http://www.notetab.com. Prepare the report while offline and save in a local directory on your computer or USB flash drive.

When you get back online fetch out the report from your flash drive or from the local directory where you had stored it on your computer to post it for FREE! Simply copy and paste it in the required fields and submit/post.

IMPORTANT! Instead of trying to make blatant sales on the forums, it would be better you sell back-end products inside the free reports which have to do with what people yearn for. You can also place your links or affiliate links in the free report, but don’t try spamming by placing more than a couple of your links in it. Make your report look a lot less “salesy”. However, if you are placing a link in the report cloak the URL using free cloaking and redirection services like http://www.tinyurl.com, http://www.snipurl.com, http://www.is.gd, http://www.budurl.com, http://bit.ly, http://www.linkbrander.com and http://goo.gl

• Tip 5 – Forum members usually see internet marketers as spammers and fraudsters until you prove yourself trustworthy. So, as a recommendation don’t try promoting or selling anything in any particular forum until you have made at least 20 posts. You need to gain the trust and respect of forum members before you start trying to sell products or services to them. If you don’t follow this simple rule you might end up not selling anything!

• Tip 6 – Another way you can gain the respect of forum members is to be more focused on posting comments and answers to their questions, instead of asking them questions. When you post questions instead of answers you are perceived as a novice. However, you can post questions in response to other questions to enable you find out more from them so that you will be able to design a solution which will really meet the questions. Forming the habit of posting answers to questions on forums will make the forum members see you as an expert instead of a novice. You also gain respect and good reputation; such that when you recommend a product or service (like an affiliate product you are promoting), they wouldn’t be suspicious about the offer.

• Tip 7 – it is also paramount that you visit these forums that you have joined a few times a week. Let the forum members see you as an active member and a valuable contributor. This will further enhance your status in the forums.

• Tip 8 – Make sure you read each forum rules and regulations before you start posting on it. Every forum has its own set of rules and regulations. Take a moment of your time to read them before you start posting. These rules and regulations are often posted as a sticky post at the uppermost top of the forum.

• Tip 9 – Protect your real identity on internet forums, except you feel like promoting your real identity. Protect your identity by signing up with pseudonyms instead of your real name.

• Tip 10 – Each forum has a set of rules. If broken, a ban may be placed on the erring member. When you are banned, don’t panic, simply open a new email address and sign up again with it using a new pseudonym.

RECOMMENDATIONS: There are tons of online forums on the internet; however in my opinion the following are the best, particularly for internet marketers.

http://www.warriorforum.com/forum
http://forums.digitalpoint.com/
http://www.selfstartersweeklytips.com/forum
http://www.wickedfire.com
http://www.copywritersboard.com
http://www.businessknowhow.com/forum
http://www.internetbasedmoms.com/bb/
http://problogger.com
http://ablake.net/forum
http://www.cbtrainingforum.com/forum.php
http://www.cashloopholes.co.uk

To find big forums that will fit in with your niche, visit http://www.big-boards.com, a directory of the most popular forums on the internet. Here you will find forums for different niches like business opportunity, money, relationship and dating, health and fitness, beauty, marketing and so on.


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