If someone was handing over free chunks of real estate in decent neighborhoods with very few conditions on its use, would you take advantage of it?  I think most of us would hop on that opportunity in a heartbeat.

Interestingly, though, many Internet marketers are failing to grab their chunks of free virtual real estate.  There are many ways to build free pages and sites that can fuel your business.

There’s nothing quite like owning and controlling your own domain.  That should always be at the core of your business.  However, there’s nothing wrong with supporting and enhancing your own site’s performance by taking advantage of the free real estate you can find online.

Are you using Squidoo lenses?  HubPages?  Do you have a Blogger.com hosted blog?  What about PageFlakes?  Tumblr?  All of those resources (and literally hundreds more) can help enhance your business.  And they’re all free.  Many of them can be used efficiently and effectively with very little effort, too. They don’t need to be a time suck that will distract you from your main site.

You don’t want to build your whole enterprise on the potentially shifting sands of free land, but you should take advantage of solid opportunities as they present themselves.  Grab and use your free Internet land.

In most cases, site monetization via Adsense isn’t the best way to go.  Generally speaking, you can secure a higher return on investment by creating a quality site featuring affiliate links to products that sell for substantially more than what you’ll net per Adsense click.

True, the conversion rate will be lower, but the considerably higher value of each conversion can more than make up the difference.

That being said, there are times when Adsense does make sense.  Sites designed to attract search engine traffic that are thick with content but short on quality, for instance, might fit that bill.  Although Adsense officially opposes these “made for Adsense” (MFA) sites, they can be a workable means of generating income.

Another example is a site that will serve up ads offering high per click values.  A site that features ads paying a nickel may be better suited for affiliate sales, but if you can isolate keywords generating a dollar per click, the math rapidly changes.

The problem with chasing expensive Adsense clicks is competition.  Adsense-based Internet marketing models exploded in popularity a few years ago and those who are now entering the field may find themselves up against some tough competition, especially in the more lucrative niches.

Search engine traffic is the holy grail of Internet marketing.  It’s targeted.  It converts.  It’s free (at least in the sense that you aren’t forking over cash for every click).  The downside?  It often requires what feels like a Herculean effort to rank effectively in competitive niches.  It also requires a little patience.

Maybe you aren’t interested in doing the work necessary to appeal to Google.  Perhaps you want instant results instead of spending time building a good SEO infrastructure.  Can you skip search engine traffic altogether?

Absolutely.  It’s possible to live without search engine traffic.  There are a variety of different ways to drive traffic that are wholly independent of organic search engine rankings.  You can rely on a variety of advertising methods, including PPC options.  You can use social media tools and other “web 2.0” methods to bypass search engine ranking concerns.

Here’s the rub:  Unless you’re willing to pay, it’s going to be hard to play.  The only way to generate a truly significant and consistent flow of visitors will involve advertising—and that’s going to cost you.

That’s why so many people eventually come back to hunting for the holy grail.  The up-front effort and time considerations don’t seem all that unbearable when you compare them to the often substantial costs of generating traffic without the search engines.

Pay per click advertising can be almost irresistible.  Driving traffic with organic search engine placement can take a lot of time and it requires some serious effort.  PPC, on the other hand, is a fast way to put eyeballs in front of your site.

You pick the keywords upon which you want to bid.  You write a simple little ad.  You hit the button.  Boom.  Instant traffic.  How tempting is that?

There is a little problem with the whole process, however.  If you don’t know how to build a good PPC campaign from top to bottom, you can lose your shirt in a heartbeat.  Remember that big wave of fast traffic?  You’re gonna pay for every last one of those visitors—and that can really add up.

Before you take the PPC plunge, take the time to prepare yourself to do it the right way.  Learn how to write effective PPC ads.  Learn the ins and outs of effective keyword research.  Determine your budget based on click costs and your probable rate of return per click.  Have a well-designed landing page in place that will actually convert those paid clicks into paying customers.

Let’s preface this post by reminding ourselves that copywriting is a true art form.  The best copywriters have an understanding of persuasion, are skilled in the use of words, and have developed a knowledge of what works and what doesn’t.

Most of us will never be top-notch copywriters.  Nonetheless, most of us will find ourselves doing some copywriting as we grow our Internet marketing businesses.  In recognition of that fact, let’s look at two common bad copywriting mistakes to avoid.

One common error among novices is assuming that the readers will have some understanding of product benefits.  We mistakenly believe that the advantages of our product are self-evident or we’re reluctant to take the time to “state the obvious”.  That’s a mistake.  Even if the reader is aware of the benefits, seeing them in black and white can reinforce them and create that “buying mood”.

Another mistake is failing to abide by quality usability guidelines.  Your sales page isn’t worth a thing if no one is going to read it and studies show that people won’t struggle with a poorly constructed message.  A lack of white space, dense paragraphs, lines of text that are too long, poor font selection and other structural considerations can doom an otherwise fine piece of copy.

If you’re going to try your hand at copywriting, remember that structure matters and that you should always shine a light on product benefits.  Those actions may not turn you into a greater writer, but they’ll definitely help.

Are you, as an affiliate marketer, really working with the right publishers?  It makes a difference.  Some publishers create circumstances that provide you with a great opportunity to profit.  Others just “dial it in”, limiting the effectiveness of your affiliate efforts.

A good publisher is going to do more than offer a good product.  He or she is also going to offer a good sales page.  Even the most skilled affiliate will have a hard time moving a product if the sales page is a dog.  Obviously, a top-notch publisher will respect affiliates enough to provide a reasonable commission, too.

A good publisher is going to go the extra mile, too.  He or she is going to offer real resources to affiliates to make things even easier.  We’re talking about good graphics, sample content, support and anything else an affiliate might be able to use to increase sales.

If you’re not working with the right publishers, you might want to survey your niche again in hopes of finding a better alternative.  Smart publishers understand that they need to do their best to take care of affiliates in order to maximize everyone’s profits.

We can isolate many different factors that separate the big players in the Internet marketing business from those who struggle to make money.  One often overlooked area of difference involves tracking.

The best marketers make a point to track and test just about everything.  They’ll be able to tell you, without hesitation, how a choice between two different headlines impacted the conversion rate of a sales page.  They’ll know how much more traffic they’ve been able to produce by distributing articles at a certain rate.  If it’s potentially valuable statistical information, they’ll have it at their disposal.

The strugglers are often working in the dark.  They don’t know what is working and how well it’s working.  They don’t really understand how their changes and experiments are affecting their business.  It’s a matter of guesswork and hunches.

Would you rather bet your financial future on a hunch or would you prefer to have solid data to guide your decision making?  That should be an easy question to answer.

You need to pay attention.  You need to invest some effort in quality tracking across all aspects of your online business.

We recently discussed the current health of the Adsense contextual advertising program and outlined a few things to avoid if you want to keep your publisher account in good standing.  We discussed the general need for keeping an Adsense account in your Internet marketing toolbox, but we never really went into any detail about why.  Here are a few reasons why you want to be part of Adsense.

Sometimes, Adsense is the quickest and easiest way to turn an otherwise valueless piece of virtual real estate into a moneymaker.  Many marketers end up having well-trafficked sites or pages that simply don’t lend themselves to any other monetization format.  When that happens, it’s nice to have Adsense to fill in the gap.

Additionally, there are times when you might want to have a form of monetization in place while you’re working on something else.  Adsense is flexible in terms of display options and it leaves you with one potential income source on projects in progress.

There are also situations in which Adsense can still out-earn affiliate links, CPA and other options.  If you’re working in a niche or with keywords that have good $/click numbers, Adsense can still be a real winner.

You don’t need to build your Internet marketing empire on the idea of becoming an Adsense mastermind, but there are some good reasons to maintain your account and to keep the Adsense option open to you.

They say that content is king, but that’s only half true.  Bad content certainly isn’t the king of anything.  If you want to get results with the written word, you need to use the good stuff.

That brings up an important consideration.  The world is full of people who think they’re top-notch wordsmiths but who are actually barely able to string a few sentences together.  Many of these folks are churning out massive quantities of content without ever realizing that their material is turning stomachs more often than its encouraging sales.

Are you a good writer?  If you’re like most people you probably answered “yes” or thought “I’m good enough”.  That may or may not be true.

You need to know the truth.  The best way to find out is to offer some of your content alongside that of a few competitors to a third-party who’s willing to tell you the truth.  Choose a “judge” with a knack for writing and professional writing or editorial experience, if possible.

Content can be king, but only if it meets a certain quality standard.  If you’re not sure whether or not you measure up, make an effort to find out.

A few years ago, article marketing was an almost underground way to make a killing.  Writing a few correctly optimized articles could lead to a backlink explosion and could drive a great deal of profitable traffic in your direction.

Article marketing still works, but it isn’t quite the bonanza it was a few years ago.  Why is that?  Are articles loosing their “traffic oomph”?

The answer is “yes and no”.  There’s nothing intrinsically different about article marketing today.  It still works the same way it always has.  The biggest change isn’t with the strategy, it’s the level of competition.  Article marketing used to get better results because fewer people were vying for success.

So, it is a little tougher, but it still works just fine.  And you can still make money as an article marketer.  You need the right content, resource boxes and keyword selection.  That’s nothing new.  Today, however, you also need to do a “little extra” to separate your contributions from the rest of a larger pack.  Giving your articles a little extra mojo can make all of the difference in the world.

You can’t just publish an article at EzineArticles and wait for the money to come pouring in these days.  But you can still make article marketing part of a winning strategy.