How the average internet user can teach you SO much.

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geekcognito

geekcognito

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Nov 19, 2006
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I was at work today and one of the guys from out in the manufacturing division comes in and asks me to buy him a special kind of tool box (I'm a purchasing agent).

So I ask him to describe it to me, but he tells me that he can "do me one better" and actually show it to me "on that there internet." So I allow him access to my computer while I stand behind him and watch.

First of all, he is baffled by Mozilla even though it was open with the Google home page up. He immediately minimized it and began searching frankly for the "E" of Internet Explorer. I didn't say a thing.

He then typed in: www(dot)tools(dot)com because, hey, it MUST have what he's looking for, right? No searching, just immediately to that URL.

If you go to Tools.com, you will notice that the sidebars just consist of two Adsense skyscrapers. He began to click each one sequentially until he found yet another site that "looked like this must be it." He may have clicked 6 ads in total just on Tools.com.

He was obviously a little frustrated because the actual page he was looking for had a "link" on Tools.com "just this morning."

I did have to fight back the urge to tell him to stop clicking ads and to just perform a search for what he was looking for, but I found the experience to be immensely informative.

The average (or below average) user has NO IDEA what even ADSENSE is. None. I'm sure most probably know this. I did as well. However, when you actually SEE someone clicking away frantically at ad after ad, it REALLY drives the point home.

Just thought I'd share. :)
 


Agree

I agree. I always pay close attention to my wife shopping online. She never enters a direct url, but always searches for a specific url in a search engine. She enters target.com in google search.

Then, she for some reason understands that the ads on the right are actually ads, but doesn't realize that the ads above the natural serps are ads also. Most of the time she ends up at some affiliate site and asks me whether I think the site is legit.

Plus, she never goes to page 2 of serps. She clicks on about every listing even if the description is clearly not relevant and if she reaches result 10 without finding what she wants, she changes her query.
 
bloard said:
Plus, she never goes to page 2 of serps. She clicks on about every listing even if the description is clearly not relevant and if she reaches result 10 without finding what she wants, she changes her query.
Click to expand...

I think that this is immensely important to remember. While I feel "OK" about getting something to number 12 or so in Google, I won't stop until I hit 5 or above. This includes (or rather, consists mainly of) long-tail keyword searches.

I think many, if not most, "average" internet users do this same thing. Hell, I've even done it many times myself.
 
people also double click on links. I see it when people use the computer O_O
 
I was in class a couple of weeks ago and my professor turned on the projector to connect his computer to it so that he could "show us a really cool site." From google he searched for drug resistant staphylococcus bacteria and immediately clicked on an ad from the sponsored links. From there he clicked adsense ad after adsense ad going to scraped content sites and was so happy at the wellspring of knowledge he was sharing with us. Probably made someone $10 within a matter of minutes. I lol'ed and people gave me all sorts of weird looks.
 
Seriously I can no longer sit there and watch an average internet user be online, I just cannot handle it anymore, I always freak out inside and feel like calling him or her a dumb fuck, I guess that's what happens when you know your shit.

I was at my mom's just the other day and she was on this herbal site and decided to do a search on the site (Oh look a Google Adsence type search), she had no clue, so I said to her you know you are making them nothing but money right now right?

She did not understand what I was talking about she kept saying how is it possible that I'm making them money when all I'm doing is searching and clicking. I was like holy fuck, I'm leaving haha.

Or the questions you get from some people, man it drives me nuts sometimes, I've actually had someone ask me what a link was. He said he hears everyone talking about links.

Even though these things drive me fucking crazy when I'm watching it happen, it also makes me extremely happy knowing that with my knowledge of the internet, I should be able to make enough money online to last me for 12 lifetimes.

That has not happened yet but I'm working on it, but yeah the average internet user usually doesn't know shit.
 
Thats funny, because just 2 months ago I had no idea that there was even a system in place as there is now. I would click on little ad's on the side, respond to auto responder emails, and get pulled in to buy a product from a convincing web page. Now, it' takes much more then "This product will make you fly in days" to get me convinced to buy anything.

The great thing about this I supose is that very few people are going to want to know how we do what we do. To most people "it's just to fucking complicated". Hey, more money for us to share eh?
 
Mr.BenjaminJoe said:
Thats funny, because just 2 months ago I had no idea that there was even a system in place as there is now. I would click on little ad's on the side, respond to auto responder emails, and get pulled in to buy a product from a convincing web page. Now, it' takes much more then "This product will make you fly in days" to get me convinced to buy anything.

The great thing about this I supose is that very few people are going to want to know how we do what we do. To most people "it's just to fucking complicated". Hey, more money for us to share eh?
Click to expand...

This is why the stats are the way they are, I don't know if you've heard but in the world of affiliate marketing 80% of people fight over 20% of the profit, while the remaining 20% of people get to enjoy the remaining 80% profit.

A lot of people sign up, think its all about saying hey click here and buy this, when they don't even know what SEO, Arbitrige, or anything else actually is, most don't even know how to code or design a website, I've met a lot of people like this who say its literally impossible to make $5 bucks on the internet.

Its funny when I meet people like this because its really not all that hard my most recent project has been a blog about a new MLM program (not saying which one but if you've seen my posts you would already know), the blog has been up for two weeks now and even though I only average $4 bucks per day with it, its going to be an ok source of income when it gets going.

But in that two weeks alone I've done more with a blog then most people I've met who have been saying its impossible to make money online, here are some of my two week stats so far.

1) Average 100 first time visitors per day.
2) Average 130 unique visitors per day.
3) Listed in Google, Yahoo, and MSN without using blackhat stuff, so far I've been strickly whitehat, by the book.
4) Average $4 bucks per day
5) 149 incoming links according to Google
6) Various backlinks, including some PR6 sites with related content to mine.
7) Been listed on both the MLM company's main website as well as their blog.
8) Members of this program tell me I've got the most informative blog there is.
9) I've got countless link exchanges, even from members who have over 10,000 referrals in as little as 8 weeks time.
10) I now only work on it about an hour or two per day because everyone is getting to know about me and they come to me for a link exchange, or for advice.

This MLM program already has 300,000 members, they expect to grow up to 10 million by July 1st, and I'm already close to being in the top 10 for their main keyword, the one keyword which will be searched the most by these 10 million members if they reach that goal.

What does all this have to do with newbies and people who say its impossible to make money online, or for the ones just starting out?

Its simple, it doesn't require a lot of work when you know how to manage your time correctly, you just need to sit down, find a game plan, and take action.

Just think I'm planning on being listed on Google for this main keyword withing another two weeks, I should be in the top 10 and within one month I should be in top 3 if not second.

If they reach their 10 million member goal and my blog is already featured all over the place including the companies main website and their corporate blog, my traffic will skyrocket, I'll cash in on my adsence and affiliate products and make more money because of the traffic they have generated then most people will make by referring people to their website in hopes they will pay out big time.

I'm only saying this so that some can treat this as a motivational speach. Just learn and do it and you will succeed, work hard.
 
i see this all of the time with people who don't understand search engines, ppc ads, etc. for nontechies, if an ad is nicely blended and it seems relevant, they click it unless it's a banner ad
 
I remember reading a long time ago that somewhere around 80% of "internet users" couldn't tell the difference between real links or ads.

BTW, don't bash these people, they make money for us...and eventually they find what they are looking for.


I still get emails from relatives on those ridiculous forwards (submit your email here to help poor Timmy.. etc).

Sometimes when I'm pissed I'll link to the origin of the spam/scam email from breakthechain.org and I'll write back "CAN'T YOU SEE THIS SHIT IS FAKE!"
 
Pretty funny. My (IMO) intelligent neighbor recently asked me how much companies pay to be listed in search engines. She had no clue that only some spots are ads and that you don't pay to list in every spot there is on every SERP. My eyes fell out of my head. This is a 28 year old regular internet user with several advanced education degrees. Not exactly living under a rock.

But your post gives me a few interesting ideas. The damn wheels are spinning (again) and I don't have time for that right now! LOL (Not that I can ignore it.)

Laura
 
BeerHat said:
BTW, don't bash these people, they make money for us...and eventually they find what they are looking for.
Click to expand...

No, I'm not bashing them at all. That was the point of the post. So maybe they aren't "savvy." Just like you said, they are the "customer" in one way or another. I'm just saying to sit behind someone at the computer anytime you get the chance, even if it's only for a minute. You will probably learn a lot about surfers' habits that will help you out in designing your sites.
 
Yeah no one wants to bash the people who make us tons of money.

Oh here is another prime example that the average internet user doesn't know what there looking at.

Yesterday I was at my mom's place and she was surfing around looking for some crap on Google and I picked up on something she kept on doing, instead of looking and clicking on the actual search results she would only click on the first two or three which were advertisements and she said she could not figure out why there is no information on this particular topic.

I explained to her that she was clicking on advertisements which mainly brought her to pages where she would have to buy something from, I then went on to tell her that each time she clicked on these advertisements some people were making some good money somewhere.

She was amazed, so I explained to her that she should be looking and clicking on the search results and not the advertisements, and within 3 minutes of telling her that she found the free information she was looking for.

There are still ton's of people out there that truly have no clue what the difference is, all my friends are some of those people, they ask me what I do at home all day long, they think I just sit around playing video games, I tried to explain the basics to them I used terms like Pay-Per-Click and Affiliate marketing, they just didn't get it, so now when someone asks me what I do at home all day long I just reply with "Nothing at all".

Its a lot easier to say that then anything else, its funny though because they always wonder how I have money in my pocket when I sit around and do nothing all day long haha.
 
chucktown said:
No, I'm not bashing them at all. That was the point of the post. So maybe they aren't "savvy." Just like you said, they are the "customer" in one way or another. I'm just saying to sit behind someone at the computer anytime you get the chance, even if it's only for a minute. You will probably learn a lot about surfers' habits that will help you out in designing your sites.
Click to expand...


I was being sarcastic and yes what you have pointed out is true.
 
My approach to internet marketing was transformed one day last year. I was on vacation in a hotel in Italy and I wanted to travel 50 miles north and stay in another hotel in Florence, but I didn't know any hotels there. I went to reception and asked if they knew a good hotel in Florence. The receptionist said she would find one on the computer. Here is how she did it:

She started internet explorer and typed the following into the address bar:

www.hotels

That was it!!!! She expected the computer to somehow magically work out from this that she wanted hotels in Florence, Italy. She then started clicking on random links, ads, everything, and got more and more frustrated, until I eventually suggested that she tried the telephone directory that was sitting right there on the desk next to her.

After this I realised that my idea of how people use the internet was completely wrong. I used to think that people didn't click on ads (because I don't) and that people at least vaguely understand that Google isn't a mind-reader. From that point on I started making pages with adsense on them and not bothering about layout, design, etc, and just trying to guess what clueless people would be searching for.
 
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