Making money online with social media and social networking is often looked at with mysticism, confusion, doubt, and misguidance. We will go over the numerous principles to capitalizing on these powerful mediums and why so many other techniques often fail. First we must understand what social media and networking sites are, and what they are not.

According to Wikipedia social media is "activities that integrate technology, telecommunications and social interaction"; social networking is very similar stating "facilitates communication between a group of individuals or organizations....shared values." The most obvious word the two share is social; the goal of these websites is to bring people together in a relevant, organized fashion, to better transfer their knowledge and passions. They are not identical but the principles are the same: people sharing knowledge, organization, shared interests. We will use the term social media to represent both fields.

Chances are you have read somewhere to focus on niche marketing. While being in a niche is a solid business plan, understand that people are people, and like people, we all are more alike than dissimilar. Do not miss out on the opportunity to reach new audiences for fear of being different; people have broad interests, personalities, and "light bulbs" that go off when they see something alien to them. If you, like many marketers focus only on niches you will pigeon hole your own growth. Here is an example. I co-run GameFriends.com, a social network for all things video game related. The gamers in the community vary from hardcore, to casual, and every degree in between. Now, if we strictly marketed to known gamers we would have a finite pool (albeit enormous) but we would be missing out on people that did NOT actively know they wanted to play games until the opportunity arose. The idea works the same way as "impulse buying". Native Americans did not know Columbus came by boats because they did not "see" the boats; it wasn't in their realm of consciousness. It was only after they were exposed to them did they "see them". Marketing works the same way; let your product/service enter the minds of the masses and you will gain new audiences.

Now making money online is not all about you (scary isn't it?). You are in a relationship with the internet, the social media site you are utilizing, and the people within it. How would you like it if your girlfriend made you mow the lawn, cook her dinner and satisfy her needs and told you good night? You would feel used at the very least, and ready to explode (with anger ha). Now on the other hand if she cooked you dinner while you mowed the lawn and gave you a back massage you would both feel pretty good. Mutual benefit is the only way true relationships work. Never make the mistake of trying to get something out of someone for nothing. As Earl nightingale has taught us mutual benefit is the only real way for prosperity. When approaching a social medium, whether a forum, a bookmarking oriented site such as digg or reddit, or a large network such facebook, myspace or GameFriends you must enter with the mindset of contributing positively to the community. In fact, making money online is the last step to becoming successful. You will only make money online once you have become successful and contributing to others success.

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