We've all heard stories about the teenage kid who builds an online marketing empire. Overnight. In his bedroom. In between playing XBox 360 and doing his homework. Or the network marketer who builds a massive organization from zero in just 90 days using the internet. (Funny they never say HOW they did it...they just "showed the plan" more). Like other eager beavers, I entered online marketing with visions of massive opt-in lists in just 30 days...generated for free! It didn't happen quite that way.

Your web presence builds if you keep at it. Online marketing is absolutely the best way to build your network marketing business for the long term. Not everybody wants to do the old "warm market" thing. Not everyone has a Rolodex of contacts. Marketing MLM online levels the playing field.

Here are a few things I learned in navigating the online marketing jungle.

When it comes to marketing online, remember that the 'net is like a river. Go with the flow. Things change. HOW you get the word out will change. Bet on it, and don't get locked into any one method. Some folks use off line advertising and use their website or system just for presenting and training. Others prospect online exclusively. Most do a combination of the two.

Outsourcing (paying someone else) may be very wise. Almost every type of online marketing can be outsourced. Buying leads is a form of outsourcing.

There are some things, like article marketing, blogging, and forums that keep your link alive for years. You can pay to have others write your articles and blog entries - some go as cheap as $8/article. You still have full copyright privileges.

Things like social networking (thousands of sites for that) are basically the same kind of prospecting and meeting people online that you do offline. The only downside to some of these sites, is that it's you and a zillion other network marketers fishing in the same spot. The communication can devolve into trading opportunity pitches. Still there are hundreds of thousands of forums. Find one you enjoy. Share. Participate. Build relationships and trust. Your customer and distributor base will grow.

Most MLM companies offer replicating websites for their distributors. Most are poorly designed, difficult to navigate and don't have capture forms. In short, I wouldn't market my MLM replicating site. Instead I would build a capture or landing page for that replicating site.

What about SEO? Most network marketers rely on replicating sites athat aren't indexed by the major search engines. Yes, page 1 of Google is the most important piece of real estate in the world for your keyword. Absolutely. So if you can build a good site and get a handle on SEO or pay big bucks to a webmaster, go for it. The key in MLM is duplication. I personally don't think that teaching SEO to my team is duplicatable. I know several successful online marketers that don't even rely on SEO as a primary means of driving traffic to their sites. They do some, but it's not their main focus.

I don't build my own websites. HTML code fries my little brain. I do build capture pages, blogs and my Squidoo page. Building websites is too time consuming for me. I use replicated marketing systems that handle all of those website details for me. I give up control of content for ease of use and freeing up my time for prospecting.

The name of the game, no matter what you do is this: Build the biggest opt-in list you can. PERIOD. Drive as many of those as you can, on your list to the website of your choice. It is the website's job to convert that traffic into customers or distributors. That's it in a nutshell.

The good news is that there are lots and lots of ways to get traffic to your sites. The "bad news" is there is not a universal starting point for everyone. Here are some things you can do, in no specific order. For best results, do as many as you can manage.

1) Article marketing

2) Blogging

3) Social Networking

4) Newspaper ads and other offline advertising

5) Business cards

6) Email marketing (this is the opt-in list)

7) Calling people on the phone
8) PPC (pay-per-click- VERY competitive and $$ if you use Google or Yahoo) but there are other search engines

9) Link exchange

10) Forums

11) Safelists - these come in a variety of forms

12) Traffic exchanges (better for capture pages and freebies like free reports)

13) Decals on your car

14) Buying targeted leads

15) Link submitters (some are good, some are bad).

Note: some directories like DMOZ won't take ANY network marketing sites or anything related to MLM or any MLM distributor...probably a way around that.

16) Offering a free report in exchange for contact info
17) Even a T-shirt or baseball cap with your URL on it!
18) Viral marketing- someone loves what you do and tells the world about it.

OK where do you start??? Pick just one technique and learn it. Offline advertising directed to your capture page is probably the easiest. Then join a couple of networking sites and forums. Learn to master one technique and then add another. Then another. Pretty soon you will have several avenues that are driving traffic to your sites, and yes, the search engines will pick up your site. Just start somewhere!!!!!