Internet Business: Not For Everyone?

Instead of approaching this from a purely business standpoint today, I'm going to take a slightly philosophical look at the internet marketplace, and who can succeed there.

Anyone who's spent time on the internet knows that certain businesses thrive and flourish there, and theoretically, anyone with a good real estate, mortgage, insurance, debt consolidation, etc., business could find solid success with a good website and some savvy marketing. Similarly, the internet has opened a number of niche markets for people who have found unexpectedly dazzling success selling fairly unglamorous products, such as tires.

But pure business aside, is the internet for everyone? It could be argued that it is not, because not everyone is up to the daily challenges presented by the world wide web. The web is a dynamic, evolving organism, which is touched daily by millions of people all over the globe. It does not sit static and grow old, and anyone who works on the internet or hopes for business success there needs to be ready to change pace with little or no warning. It's the nature of the beast. The internet offers the most advanced, most current, most "cutting edge" opportunities -- but, in order to take advantage of them, you need to be prepared to live on the edge. If you live on the edge, you need to understand that sometimes, you fall off. And you don't always land on your feet.

So is this risk for everyone? Perhaps not. That doesn't mean that people who prefer a more stable business (or life, for that matter) can't explore internet opportunities. It just means that they probably won't find themselves at the forefront of the evolution, except by accident. It means they could achieve modest success, but probably won't be one of the breakout thrill rides that have skyrocketed some people to the top. All things considered, they might be happier that way.

What does it take to stay on the forefront of the ever-changing internet? It takes a willingness to immerse yourself in it, day in and day out, so that you can be the one spotting the trends, instead of reading about them 6 months later. It takes a willingness to abandon your success formula overnight, and start again from the ground up when you see that yesterday's solution is today's problem. It takes a willingness to change your services, switch products, or revamp your website, on a routine basis. It means trying to out-guess the millions of faceless internet users worldwide, and give them what they want. For many people, that prospect is one giant headache.

For me, as of yesterday afternoon, it means trying to figure out how Yahoo!'s new search program fits into my SEO world, and that's not going to be easy. For the past few months, it has meant revisiting a lot of websites and examining the optimization used, seeing if I can tweak or improve it to please Google, who's been changing the rules constantly.

It means daily challenges and, yes, sometimes frustrations, but it's exciting, and it's a great feeling when it all comes together, and you have a website that offers the right thing, at the right time, is designed and optimized just right, and you get to see it fly to the top of the rankings and get sales through the roof. It doesn't happen often, but when it does, it's all worth it!