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Internet Flea Market Sites - 
Do You Own One of These?

I'm sure you've seen these site. Heck, you might even own one yourself.  An Internet flea market site is one that promotes several different kinds of products, services, programs, and opportunities that have no relation to each other.  

The site usually has a headline of some sort and is followed by a listing of various links to everything the person is promoting online.  There is usually no rhyme or reason for the order or selection of the links. The owner of the site just appears to list any and everything they thought could make them some extra cash.

Here is an example of an Internet flea market site:

This is an official Internet flea market site.  There is no rhyme or reason for the placement of the links, nor is there any apparent theme to the site. I have seen many, many sites like this and all I can do is shake my head.

First of all, one of the key ways to bring traffic to your site is by getting listed in heavy-traffic directories like Yahoo and the Open Directory.  Well, in order for these sites to even consider your site for their directory:

1. It must have an obvious theme (i.e. fit in one main category),

2. It should look somewhat professional and organized,

3. Reside on your own domain, not (Freeyellow, Hotyellow, Geocities, etc.)

4. And it should have valuable content - not just a bunch of links linking to a dozen other sites.

Well, by looking at the above page, it's quite difficult to determine what category to put this site in since it advertises so many different types of products, services, etc.  And most directories like Yahoo and the Open Directory, do not have a category called "Miscellaneous Web Sites."  Just for the record, these directories wouldn't even look twice at this type of web site.

Second, people make money on the web because they KNOW the interests of their web site visitors and they sell products and services that appeal to their interests.  With so many different kinds of offers on your site, you'll get nothing but different kinds of visitors and would be very difficult to determine what their needs are and who is interested in what opportunity.  So instead of selling a lot of everything, you'll probably sell very little of anything. 

People that succeed on the web, sell OVERdelivering products and services to a specific audience that WANT and NEED what they have to offer.  It sounds simple, but 90% of people that try to make money on the web do not grasp that concept.  

As Ken Evoy explains so well in his e-book Make Your Site Sell, It is impossible to sell to everyone.  You must find a specific target audience (at home moms, computer programmers, robot lovers, webmasters, etc.).  Then build your web site around that target audience.

Sure, the owner of the above page, may make a bit of cash on several of the opportunities listed, but think of how much more he or she would make by choosing one or two related offers and develop a theme around those offers.

For example, say you were selling ceramics from your home and you wanted to build a web site.  Your main product would be the ceramics, of course, but then you could add additional income generators by finding additional products/services related to ceramics.  

• Perhaps Amazon.com has books on ceramics that you could feature from your site. You'll earn roughly 15% from every person you get to buy.  

• You could write a newsletter on ceramics and publish it weekly, or

• Provide links to other ceramic sites on the web

Not only will this add depth to your web site, but it will force repeat visits.  And more importantly, you will know for sure that the people that come to your site are interested in ceramics.  You won't have to guess about your visitor's interests like you would if you promoted the sample flea market site above.

So now that you know what your visitors like, you can offer more and more products and services that caters to their wants and desires.  The better you do this, the more money you'll make.

Fortunately, the development of the affiliate program was a great addition to Internet commerce.  An affiliate program allows you to market another company's product or service and you earn a commission for every order you generate.

Go to AssociatePrograms.com. This is one of the largest directories of affiliate programs.  You can find a program for almost any category you can think of and a good majority are free to join.  Allan Gardyne, the site owner, also provides excellent advice on how to succeed with these types of programs.

Think about a topic you are interested in. Find some free affiliate programs that are RELATED to this topic and build a site around this theme. That way, when people go to your site, they know exactly what to expect.

That's exactly what I did with this site.  I happen to have some experience with Internet marketing. Not only do I do this on a daily basis, but I LOVE it. So I built a site on something that I have a passion for. As you can see, all of the products and services I discuss on this site are related to Internet marketing, and what's more,  I KNOW that's why people come here....to market their business.

It would not do *you* or *me* any good to promote a book about lawn gardening or snowboarding on this site.  First of all, I know NOTHING about either of the two, and second, these types of products would get overlooked by most of you because you come here to get help on marketing your business, product, or service.

I know a lot of this may sound a bit elementary, but you'd be amazed at the number of flea market sites that are out here.  People think that the more products, services, and opportunities they list on their web sites, the more they MUST sell.

Not true.

You can actually make MUCH more on the Internet selling one or two RELATED products or services if you build an effective site with a theme, valuable content, and promote it like crazy.

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