The first and foremost characteristic of Internet Marketing is automation. Alex Mandossian once said that "Internet Marketing is meant to train us as lazy workers but high thinkers." We are constantly thinking of better ways to attain 100% automation, which is near impossible, for thinking itself is already hard work.

Despite this, Internet Marketing may not be simple, but it is definitely very systematic in nature, such that it is really an easy business to do due to the availability of metrics software for performance measurement. By knowing and understanding results-by-the-numbers, Internet marketers can tweak and re-launch sales and marketing campaigns for better returns. This is not something that brick-and-mortar businesses are capable of and ready to embrace as part of their daily business handling activities.

Coming back to principles, here are 10 things you can always bear in mind as you go about doing your business online. Even if you are attempting one niche after another (and that's what some self-employed do these days), following a certain entrepreneurial pattern based on principles can help you get into the thick of action easily and systematically.

1) Provide lots of quality content on your website. The litmus test is: Would you freely publish something that you would otherwise sell?

2) Be tight, comprehensive and cohesive about your site theme. For example, your site may be about dogs rather than dog collars, which is a smaller, more focused niche. Nonetheless, you can design and implement a clear structure with different sections covering dog training, dog hygiene, dog naming, dog psychology, doggy habits, etc. You can aim for a portal or library of information and it can still not be confusing.

3) Setup a blog. You heard this many time: "Search engines love blogs." Well, go and create one, link it up to your main site, publish snippets of information and send out RSS feeds. Search engines will find you fast!

4) Create a plan of using traffic exchanges, safelists, FFA lists etc. to draw traffic to your site. I, like many people, did not believe that you can funnel targeted traffic from these places, until I came across a few experts in this area.

5) Build a lead capture page offering a powerful freebie, an e-course or a reason visitors can't refuse...on condition they must subscribe to you.

6) Create free materials like viral e-books to give away. Write articles and e-courses and submit everywhere you can. Reuse your articles to suit every possible form of online and offline media. Just keep your eyes open. What goes around always comes around. You are bound to be famous on the Internet in 6 months if not a year. Or start an article/free e-book directory service yourself! You can attract more writers and material seekers with the most minimal of effort.

7) Get your visitors and subscribers involved with YOU. Give them a role, a stake or control over the content of your site, forum, chat room, online survey or newsletter etc. You can sustain their interest and effectively build up not only traffic volume but also the quality of customer relationships overtime. The noblest yet most challenging thing to do is finding ways to build up their own monetary value. That's what Jay Abraham, Bob Proctor and many other experts do.

8) Create an affiliate program for your products and services to encourage affiliates bring new referrals to you! It's a great way to get targeted newcomers to your site.

9) Create postcards with your e-zine information and business cards to hand out at events. Also print out articles and hand them around at events (which must be appropriate in context). Your signature at the articles' end leads them to your site. Show them you are the expert here!

10) One great way to multiply subscriber addresses in your list is invite fellow online marketers to swap e-zine ads with you. Many marketers know the benefit of this, and it's free and easy to implement. All it takes is mutual agreement on how often and how many times to publish each other's ads!

Yes, there is a lot of work involved, these 10 points are only general and the devil is in the details. But you see, even though I'm no SEO or link exchange techie, I am carrying out all 10 points in my daily work and with continuous measurement of my results my income has nowhere else to go but up as I optimize the monetary value of my effort. Ultimately I am doing what these 10 points say because they can sustain online longevity.

When you seriously put them into practice, turning your actions into regular habits is only a matter of time. In one year, your situation will be much better than where you are today, and all you need to do is create a system of productive action based on these 10 points. This is my encouragement to you.