“Tens and thousands of businesses are in the dark after a new storm hit the Northeast.”   

“The 9/11 demons continue to haunt thousands who have lost their homes, businesses and their jobs as a result of the attack.”

“Surprise drop in retail sales as snow hits stores.” 

This article on diversification may seem different from the usual Internet marketing articles you get from me. But I assure you that it’s relevant to the subject and it’s important.

When unfortunate things happen and everything around crumbles, I can still survive because my business is not affected.  I don’t have to worry about losing my business and my source of income.  I don’t have to worry about what’s going to happen to my family.

This is one of the important things that had first drawn me to online marketing, apart from the income potential of course.

It gave me a sense of security, a feeling that what I earn depends only on what I do, and no external forces, be it natural or man-made can take it away from me.

What am I trying to say?

Diversification: Don’t Put All Your Eggs In One Basket 

If you’ve been around for as long as I have, you would know that not so long ago, internet marketing revolved around creating websites for Adsense. Adsense income was the primary income source online and thousands of people joined. Successful marketers made thousands of dollars online by creating hundreds of sites with Adsense.

One fine day, Google slapped all the Adsense sites that it considered garbage and de-indexed them overnight.  People who were relying solely on Adsense income were brought to their knees. They lost everything, their income stopped just like that.

There are others, like the Panda and EMD updates. Webmasters suddenly noticed a drop in traffic or rankings. Panda hit tens of thousands of marketers who relied exclusively on article directory submissions and buying domains with exact match keywords.  Then came the Penguin that caused a lot of panic, and brought with it the “over-optimization” penalty.

The worst part is the hit on the revenue, which either seriously diminished or completely wiped out.

You may be using Facebook for your traffic and one day your account is shut down, because Mr Zuckerberg and his watchmen don’t like something you’re doing. Where do you stand?

In 2011, when the Google Panda update came out, hundreds of sites lost visibility. Hubpages.com had a visibility loss of -87%.

There are plenty of other examples I can give, but by now you must have a good idea of what I’m trying to say.

Putting all your eggs in one basket can hurt you. Look at it this way. When you rely on anything that you DON’T control, you’re asking for serious trouble.  You may be doing very well, but you’ve no clue when you’ll be attacked.

The Need For Diversification 

Many marketers make the mistake of thinking that because its online business, they’re safe. But I’ve seen so many people losing everything when the rug was pulled from under their feet. They relied on a single platform, placing their trust in that platform, never imagining that anything could go wrong.

Online marketing is definitely a safer alternative to a brick-and-mortar business and it gives you convenience that cannot be denied, but only when you use diversification.

If you’re promoting Clickbank products, you may want to look at other affiliate networks too.  If you’re using Google Adwords, it makes sense to use social networks too. You don’t want to end up relying only on one form of traffic. Social networking sites are one of the best sources of traffic, as you’re not relying on the search engines alone.

The Importance Of Residual Income 

While diversification is essential to be successful in online marketing, residual income can make a huge difference.

Why not create your own eBook to sell, and create a small residual income coming in? The idea is to not rely on having to work physically in order to get paid.

When your Internet marketing is your only source of income, what happens the day you can’t work as much as you do now?  The reason can be anything, but your income is going to come to a halt.

None of us think that anything can happen to us. It’s human tendency to be happy and thrilled at the way things are going, and hoping that things will continue to go well. But things do go wrong and we must be prepared for that.

Are You Taking A Backup? 

This happened with me a couple of times. I was staring at the blank screen of my PC. Need I tell you that all information was gone! But I had a backup of the entire thing. I’ve heard horror stories of how businesses died along with their computers.

The reason for backing up is simple: If your computer stops working or your hard disk crashes and you can’t retrieve the information or if you lose access to your data, then you can get the information from the backup copies. You can use an external hard drive for making these copies.

Are you taking a backup?

You can either take a backup by “copying” important files or through “imaging.” Imaging, unlike copying specific files, makes a copy of everything; your data, your programs, your settings and even the operating system.

Think Of A Diversification Plan Today 

What are you doing currently? Are you focusing on a single platform or income stream? If something goes wrong with that, are you totally lost? Do you have another source of income? What can you do to change your situation?

These are the questions you should be asking yourself and use a mind map to jot down the answers to your questions. Plan on creating a residual income! Network marketing is an excellent example of residual income. eBook creation is another. Come up with your own ideas and see what works for you.