Many online marketers seem to have lost a piece of the sales puzzle that is essential to marketing in the real world – the art of selling yourself.

In truth, your online personality can be as useful a marketing tool as the product or service you are marketing. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone to a website intent on buying a product only to decide not to when the site was cold and impersonal. Personality sells, people!

When you create an online persona that is realistic and likable, people will identify with the person you are representing and studies have proved time and time again that people buy from people they like and identify with. Notice I haven’t said the first thing about talking about yourself in this online persona? You don’t have to reveal personal information to have an online presence – you don’t even have to use you real name! Truth be known, I have been working on the Internet since its inception and I rarely ever use my own real name.

Keep It Simple

A simple, personal website with a small bio and some basic info about “you” can go a long way toward increasing your credibility as an online marketer. When you are selling products that are primarily of interest to men – fishing, for instance – a very basic blog site (without flashy graphics or HTML tricks) that talks about fishing and periodically includes an embedded link to a new type of tackle that you really like (which also happens to be an affiliate product) can accomplish a lot more than a standard sales line.

Personalize the process and the sales will follow. The ‘net is impersonal enough. By creating an online presence you make it easier to personalize your marketing and create an approachable individual experience. In other words, you are showing the reader how your product or service applies to someone in the real world – namely you.

A MySpace page or a free blog* can make the process of creating an online persona a breeze, but you really need to invest some time in building this presence into something that is reliable and strong. Establishing yourself and working consistently at it on a regular basis will show your readers that you aren’t going away any time soon. And that, my friends, is the sort of stability that creates and builds consumer confidence.

*For a free blog I recommend Blogger.com, as they allow marketing, ads and affiliate programs to be displayed on your free site.

Michael Nolan
IM Rookie Contributor

IMRookie.com

Popularity: 59% [?]

If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!

• Multi-Level-Marketing and Affiliate Marketing – Don’t Get it Confused.
• Common Myths about Online Businesses Debunked!
• Catapulting Yourself Into The Limelight Using Product Reviews
• MySpace and You – Where Do You Fit?
• Affiliate Marketing 101: What is it and how does it work?

Tags: Affiliate-Marketing, Internet Marketing Articles, Social Media Online //