So how exactly do you make substantial profits on the Internet?

Well there are literally thousands of ways to earn a living online.But many of those require things that you and I would never have access to such as, corporate bankrolls, and corporate manpower. I'm just a one-man business and I'm guessing that you are too.

So with that in mind I am going to show you a very powerful way to make profits online. Its just two words “Affiliate Programs”

So what the heck are affiliate programs and how do they work?

Affiliate programs can vary from website to website, but the main idea behind affiliate programs is that a website will pay you for sending them buying customers.

You send people to a website, if they buy something from that website you get a cut of the purchase.You will usually be paid either a percentage of the sale or a flat
rate.

Here is a random list of websites that have affiliate programs. The dollar amount shows how much ONE SINGLE PERSON is earning every month with that affiliate programs.

- Posters.com------------ $5,000/mo
- Sitesell.com------------ $10,000/mo
- 1HideOut.com--------- $3,000/week
- Marketingtips.com---- $8,000/mo
- Gen-fit.com------------ $18,000/mo
- Pillstore.com----------- $50,000/mo
- Keycode.com---------- $5,000/mo
- PartyPoker.com------- $15,000/mo

I could go on forever with these amazing figures.

Everywhere you look, people are making massive profits on the Internet. I'm showing you these figures in hopes that you will get excited about affiliate programs. If you can become successful in just one affiliate program, your life will change dramatically.

The easiest and the simplest method that anyone can make money with through affiliate program is the combination of Clickbank and Adwords. A simple method through which anyone can make outrageous amounts of money.
Consider this imagine working with ten different affiliate programs that convert 5 - 20 sales a day? If you were paid $15 for each sale,that would mean you could be making $22500-$90000 per month.Even if you had a bad month and only made one sale everyday for each affiliate, you would still be making over $4500 per month. You may think all of this is insane, but trust me; there are tons of people out there just like you and me who are utilizing affiliate programs on the Internet and making huge profits from them.

It is also forecast that within 2-3 years, 50% of all online sales will be made through the help of affiliate programs. You don't have to be good with math to figure out that there is an enormous
opportunity waiting to be tapped. But don't wait, act now!! Now is the best time to get rolling, if you can establish your self with online affiliate programs now, you will have good positioning to just sit back and watch your profits increase as the Internet continues to grow, which is inevitable.

One of the biggest problems for Bloggers, Forums or websites with guest books is the Sploggers. Sploggers are those who post worthless ads with lots of links to online sales sites for things like Viagra. These Sploggers look for well-trafficked websites and they often use online article submission websites full of links from online article marketers in their bylines to their websites.

Once a Splogger gets onto your website they can wreak havoc and ruin it. If you have to continually monitor those sites then it takes up all your time. If you make it tough for them by adding in security features then that makes it hard for your customers and regular clientele ruining your interactive-ness. Additionally, the Sploggers may retaliate by trying to hack your site or increase their splogging using changes in tactics. How do I know? Well, I have had this occur and I have discussed this with other article marketers.

What can you do to help prevent this? Well there are many things you can do including carefully choosing, which type of website tools that you use in your online business. Online Article Submission Sites do attract Sploggers to your website, but in reality any high-traffic site will attract Sploggers and if you are an article marketer you work very hard to get increased traffic. With all that good target traffic will come what I call the absolute scum of the Earth; Sploggers. (Opinion).

It is not the online article submission site that is causing this, it is the criminals or Sploggers. The reason that the online article sites are often used by sploggers to find you, is merely proof how well online article submission sites work and why you should use them.

One of the fastest and most profitable ways to skyrocket your online sales and boost your profits is through using Joint Ventures!

Joint ventures utilize the powerful marketing concept known as "leverage". This form of marketing utilizes the existing strong bonded relationships and goodwill that other companies have already established with people who are your potential customers.

The main draw of joint ventures is that it truly is a win-win business proposition. It allows you and your joint venture partner the opportunity to leverage each other's assets and resources for the benefit of all parties - you win, your joint venture partners win, and your customers and subscribers win.

It has extremely low cost and low risk, and is one of the fastest ways of bringing your product to market by using other people's resources.

It is a great way to acquire new subscribers and customers with practically no costs. It allows you to leverage your joint venture partner's traffic, existing subscribers and customers. You don't have to incur expenses in acquiring new traffic and you can be pretty certain that the traffic you get from your joint venture partner is targeted, therefore, likely to be profitable.

Cutting joint venture deals doesn't necessarily need to be confined to only non-competitors. You can cut deals with your competitors too, and you should!

Find out who is selling to your target market, what products and/or services they are selling, and who your target market trusts and has a good relationship with. You will then want to contact them to propose a joint venture deal by offering them complementary products and/or services. If you are a reputable company that offers high quality products/services, it should be really easy for you to find other companies to partner with.

To form a successful joint venture, it is necessary to first be absolutely clear about one's own goals; second, be clear about the attributes one is seeking in a partner; and third, when negotiating with potential partners, be open and prepared to give as well as take.

If you plan on hosting products through joint venture endorsement marketing, you must build a strong relationship with your audience. Or, if you are the beneficiary, you must team up with hosts who have a good relationship with their audience.

The stronger the relationship that the endorser has with his audience, the greater will be the response. For an endorsement to work most profitably, it must blend in with the endorser's prior communications with the audience.

Trading links is a joint venture because two websites are hosting the other's website link, helping to drive traffic to the sites as well as increase search engine rankings. This particular joint venture technique is being used frequently on the web today because of the sheer importance of links and their bearing on search engine results. If you are having problems getting business then you might consider linking your products and services with another website that has a similar target market and complementary products. This way you can share the expense of the website, hosting account, and administrative costs, and split the difference on products. It's a good way to cut down on overhead and increase your inventory at the same time.

You can also enter into a list building joint venture with ezine publishers where all partners promote each other's ezine at the subscription thank you page. After someone has subscribed to your ezine, you'll redirect them to the subscription thank you page where you display your joint venture partners' ezines. In this way, all of you can build your list much faster as all the partners are leveraging on each other's resources. You can increase the size of your opt-in and ultimately your customer list very quickly. It's not uncommon to add hundreds of new subscribers to your list within minutes of launching your joint venture.

You can also team up with another website or business in their autoresponder advertising campaign. Both websites can host these ads for the other website and as a result, have more coverage and business.

Joint venture with another website to write an e-book that outlines different services and provides good information for visitors. Ensure that reading the e-book is actually worthwhile and informative. Then, include advertisements for both businesses in the e-book and allow the e-book to be downloaded for free from both websites. This is great advertising and by giving something away for free you will make your visitors feel more positive about your company.

You might have specialised knowledge with high demand but you lack product creation skills. You can easily approach someone who's good at creating products, such as, e-books, tapes and videos, to strike a joint venture deal. You can provide the specialised knowledge whilst your joint venture partner can be responsible for creating the products.

You may have a discussion forum. You invite several publishers to participate at your discussion forum. One of those publishers participates and then announces your discussion forum to his audience. When he does this, he gets his audience to go to your discussion board. Not only do the audience members gain helpful information at the discussion board, but they see the helpful posts of that publisher whereby their loyalty to that publisher is increased.

Testimonials have been proven to make visitors feel more comfortable and confident with a product or company. You can create a joint venture to help another website with their testimonials and have them do the same thing for you.

Free information/resource endorsements are the easiest to get on the internet. By creating an online infrastructure that supplies helpful information, publishers, who are obligated to supply helpful information to their audience, will feature some aspect of your infrastructure. This aspect is usually something that supplies helpful information, like a discussion board, ezine, helpful website, article, or what have you.

When writing product endorsement letters or scripts, you must focus on how you can make the endorsement appear as editorial rather than sales copy. This is harder to do in a product endorsement than a free resource endorsement. That's why you need to make a special offer to the endorser's audience.

The secret to executing successful joint venture endorsements is to have the endorser convey to his audience that he is genuinely trying to help them reach the end result they desire, through his endorsement... he's not trying to sell them something... he's trying to help them.

You should come up with reason to explain to the audience why they are receiving the endorsement. You can use reasons like these:

"My friend just released a new product... and after trying it out, I immediately contacted him to see if he could make a special offer to you, my customer. And here's what he said..." "After reading this information and trying the product, I couldn't help but passing this on to you..."

"One of my long-time mentors contacted me the other day... After talking with him for a while, I convinced him to..."

"I was looking for a Valentine's Day gift for my customers, and here's what I found..."

"I can't help sharing this with you... This is brand-new, and I wanted to let you know before every body else finds out..."

"My friend told me about this... I couldn't believe it at first, but when I tried it out - it worked! Now, let me tell you about it..."

If done correctly, joint ventures can literally explode your online sales and profits in short order.

For those of you who do not like spending too much time in department stores looking for the “perfect” present you will never find, buying gift certificates for your loved ones is the ideal way to show how much you love them. But what if the person you want to buy the present for is just like you, and does not like going out to shop?

Some people do not enjoy going to malls and departments stores and dealing with all the people. They do not want to drive through traffic, spend a long time finding a parking space, and deal with the crowds. For these people, shopping for their items online is the way to go. So why not get them an online gift certificate to their favorite place to shop?

Online shopping is a relatively new thing for many people. The number of online customers has been increasing steadily every year. During this past holiday season, we set an all-time high in the amount of products bought over the Internet. Just about everything you will ever need can be bought online today. If your loved one is the type of person who consistently buys from online stores, then this is the present that is perfect for him or her.

There are some drawbacks to this trend of increasing online sales. Many people believe that this hurts our social structures. Some experts believe that the decrease of interaction with other people can become unhealthy. It is true that human interaction is important to our holistic health.

Buying online gift certificates for your friends and family is a convenient way to show them that you care for them. Despite what people may say, shopping online will not turn them into a shut-in and cause them to lock themselves away from human interaction. Online shopping will only help save them time. If they are busy, and do not have time to go to the store, they can shop in the comfort of their own home.

As more Internet consumers begin to use broadband connections for their personal use, the more options you have to incorporate rich Internet applications (RIA) into your website. A Rich Internet application will provide your users with a new and improved web experience that is mutually interactive, engaging and flexible. RIAs provide the instant response that is received when using desktop applications but now on the web. Examples of RIAs can be a product configurator, an Internet Bot, or an intuitive audio and video site. Now many of these use heavy amounts of bandwidth but as more people move to broadband there will be no issue in terms of page load time.

Two popular technologies that are being used to create rich Internet applications are Macromedia Flash and AJAX. Flash is a popular authoring software that was developed by Macromedia. It is used to create vector graphics-based animation programs with navigation interfaces, graphic illustrations, and simple interactivity for the Web. AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) is a term describing a web development technique for creating interactive web applications using a combination of: * HTML (or XHTML) and Cascading Style Sheets for presenting information * Document Object Model and JavaScript to dynamically display and interact with the information presented * XML, XSLT and the XMLHttpRequest object to interchange and manipulate data asynchronously with a web server.

Ok, so this might sound a little confusing right now but my point is that these two technologies offer the flexibility to provide a more engaging user experience that will increase customer satisfaction and ultimately increase your sales. Many large companies, such as Reebok, Dodge, Timberland and Ikea have already developed rich Internet applications for their websites to provide a more interactive and engaging user experience. If you click on the links above, you will see an example of the various types of rich Internet applications that I’m talking about. Reebok and Timberland provide a custom product configurator that is 100% interactive and allows you to build, customize and purchase your own shoe online, Dodge provides an extreme audio and video experience that is truly engaging and visually appealing to the eye, and Ikea uses Anna, their female bot, to help answer your questions and guide you to the specific area of the site that you are looking for.

So now you’re probably saying, “Ok, this is cool and all, but how will this increase my sales?” In my opinion, it all comes down to proving a web experience to your users that is unlike any other site. If you provide your user with an engaging and interactive experience that is user-friendly and easy to navigate then I guarantee you will increase customer satisfaction, which will increase sales. Your users will have so much fun building your product or interacting with your bot that they will be more inclined to make a purchase from your website. And even if they do not purchase from you, they are likely to pass a link to your site to their friends and family, who may purchase from you.

It’s all about the exposure. Providing an experience for your users that is unparallel to your competition will be sure to drive traffic and increase sales. So think about the future of the Internet, research the Internet “big dogs”, and analyze how you can begin to incorporate rich Internet applications into your website. If you do this now, you will be way ahead of your competition.

To maximize on your sales from the same limited traffic your low traffic site receives, you will need to implement the oldest trick in the book. Despite its age it still works.

This is trapping email addresses and following up on them with relevant mailings, special reports and regular ezines. A good place to solicit for email addresses by possibly advertising your free ezine or special report, is on your sales page.

There is no denying that very few clients will buy from you the first time they come across your offer. It rarely happens. Most will buy from you after they have gotten quite familiar through several contacts, like receiving several editions of your email newsletter or reading a special report that really impressed them. This is the reason why any online selling system that does not include a strategy for harvesting email addresses, is losing a substantial volume of sales.

Asking for email addresses at the selling page can be tricky because you want to avoid losing sales. The way to do it is to have a brief pop-up message that will be red before they get into your sales copy. Or alternatively have a link right at the end that leads to another page or site that talks about your special report, email newsletter or whatever it is that you use to harvest email addresses and build an opt-in email list.

Internet Marketing Strategy was Corey Rudl's genius. Insider Secrets for Marketing Your Business on the Internet was a labor of love developed by Corey. And it didn't happen easily for him. Hours of learning and research went into gaining this knowledge and compiling this internet marketing strategy system for making money online.

In June 2005, tragedy struck when Derek Gehl lost his good friend, colleague, and mentor, Corey Rudl, to the sport Corey was most passionate about -- car racing. Corey's passing stunned the entire internet marketing community. But one thing became very clear, very quickly: everyone was adamant that Corey's Internet Marketing Strategy must continue, no matter what.

And so, while Derek had always been content to work "behind the scenes," he suddenly found himself thrust into a very public role. With the blessing of Corey's family, and the support of all of Corey’s customers, Derek began running the company. Corey might be gone but his internet marketing strategy system is still very viable for making money online, and I would suggest you take a serious look at it.

Frankly when I finished studying Corey’s internet marketing strategy, -The Insider Secrets to Marketing Your Business on the Internet, - I was overwhelmed by the huge amount of information he managed to pack into this tutorial. The package included two hefty binders with over 1,300 pages, 4 guidebooks and 3 resource CDs. But I guess I shouldn't have been surprised; after all, when the box containing these materials showed up at my door, it weighed in at over 10 pounds!

That's 10 pounds of the most comprehensive internet marketing strategies, test results, case studies, tools, and ideas for making money online that I have ever read. In fact, the only negative here is the time I needed to study all the information packed into Insider Secrets.

If you're unsure who Corey Rudl was, you should know that he was a recognized expert in online marketing strategy for the last 10 years. Not only did his Insider Secrets generate millions for him in online sales, his sites still attract thousands of visitors a day.

His package includes step-by-step advice for starting your own internet business. It covers how to build a website for under $100.00 and where to find those hot niche products that everyone talks about. It showed me many free and cheap online tools, resources and software that I found invaluable.

Of course, getting visitors to your website is always the first priority and Corey’s system showed me how to get new qualified visitors for free. He went into detail on how to get high rankings in the search engines, even Google. He also shared his secrets on writing sales copy that helped increase my sales substantially. Derek Gehl has kept this information up to date, changing the techniques as the internet grows and changes.

What's really great about Corey’s Insider Secrets is that it can show anyone how to build a profitable internet business even if you're completely technically challenged like me.

And if you already have an internet business making money online, as I do, this excellent information will take you to the next level. The advanced sections of his system show you how Corey increased his profits dramatically.

It will take time to go through this package and really get a total grasp of all his techniques and strategies. After all, it contains two binders of lessons plus the three CD’s and the four guidebooks. You may be a little confused at first but reread it again because it will all make sense.

This review is meant to be a useful, educational and an instructive resource for anyone interested in making money online with proven internet marketing strategies.

This package is not a quick fix as I said. It will take time and patience, but it was worthwhile for me.

I feel completely comfortable giving the Insider Secrets system a 9 out of a possible 10! It is 1,300+ pages of step-by-step lessons containing the exact internet marketing strategies Corey personally used to build a highly successful internet business. If you follow this plan like I did, you too will build a business on the internet, in a reasonable period of time.

What is the most important key in capturing your niche market on the internet? What you need to know about making online sales?

First of all, you may have already had your market researched and decided on what product that you can help your market with (this is very crucial in finding success and fortune). You may have attract traffic to your site by posting on the internet about the service that you provide. Visitors come and go. From 50 visitors to your online store, maybe only 3 will buy your product. But how do you keep the others attached to your website? The most important thing here is, START-YOUR-OWN-OPT-IN-LIST!

With the Opt-in function you can turn your visitors into subscribers. But why do you need this? Because, it will be easier for you to get in-touch with your customer. And it will be easier for you to launch campaign and promote your next product or make 'Back-End Sales'. If you are involve in information services, it will be much easier for your customer to get in-touch with the latest free info that you’ve got.

Hmm, how can you turn them into your subscribers? The answer is you must provide them with information such as what are the free benefit that they can get once the subscribed to your list. And maybe you can say, they will get 20% discount for every new product that you’ll launch if they subscribe to your list.

Having your own Opt-in list, will keep you on track with your customer. Additional information such as age, gender and interest, may help you in future to understand your niche and get the right product, to improve sales. Your marketing then will reach directly to your market!

There are free Opt-in list providers which you can subscribe from site such as http://www.bravenet.com/, (I’m not one of the team) which is easy to use newsletter, (just copy & paste the code).

Once you have your opt-in list done, you can create auto-responders and start building your inventories of newsletter to be published monthly.

In the last column we discussed the process of credit card enabling your brick-and-mortar business. I pointed out that research has shown that accepting credit cards can help increase revenue and speed up cash flow. This week we will look at setting up an online payment system for your business website. If you think hooking up a brick-and-mortar location with a credit card system stymies most bankers, try asking them how to do it on your website.

The fact is most banks can provide you with the merchant account needed to accept credit card payments online, but beyond that, they have little to do with the process. Even larger banks may only have a single person on staff that is tasked as the "credit card processing expert" and if that person ever goes on vacation, you're pretty much out of luck (voice of experience talking here, folks).

I have helped many clients set up online credit card processing systems and more than once I've had to sit down with the bank issuing the merchant account and educate them on how online payment systems work. Don't believe me? This is a direct quote (here's the Bible, here's my hand) from the manager who was in charge of processing Internet merchant account applications at a local bank, "When someone pays online how do they swipe the credit card in their computer..."

You will need the following to accept credit cards on your website: (1) an electronic shopping cart system; (2) a payment gateway service; (3) a credit card processor; and (4) an internet merchant account issued by a bank or other financial institution or service bureau.

Here's how online credit card processing works. (1) Your customer submits his credit card information at checkout on your website. (2) The shopping cart software sends the transaction to the gateway. (3) The gateway routes the information to the processor. (4) The processor contacts the bank that issued the customer's credit card. (5) The issuing bank approves or declines the transaction. (6) The processor routes the result back to the gateway who then passes the result back to the website shopping cart system. The entire process is done electronically and takes seconds to complete.

We covered most of these elements last week. Here's a quick refresher for those who missed the basics, then we'll talk about the shopping cart system you'll need to implement on your website.

Payment Gateway Service: The payment gateway service comes into play when a customer submits their credit card information to the webpage form. Think of the gateway service as the middleman in the process. The website's shopping cart checkout system electronically submits the credit card to the gateway service that then routes the information to the processor for approval.

Credit Card Processor: The credit card processor is an electronic data center that processes the credit card transactions coming from the gateway company, ensures that the charge is valid, then settles the funds in your merchant account.

Internet Merchant Account: An Internet merchant account is a bank or account in which funds from online sales are deposited by the processor. Merchant accounts are usually issued by banks that are associated with the major credit card services like Visa and MasterCard. Be aware that many banks will not grant merchant accounts to Internet merchants as they are often categorized as "high risk ventures." This policy varies widely and in the end, the granting of the merchant account will come down to economics from the bank's point of view. If the bank sees even the smallest iota of risk, you will not be granted the account.

Fortunately, the growth of online sales has given rise to an entire industry of merchant service bureaus that will grant you a merchant account and everything else you need to accept online payments. The fees are usually higher, but it's better than not having an online payment system at all.

Shopping Cart System. To accept online payments you must have what's called a "shopping cart system" that allows the customer to select and purchase products from your website. A shopping cart system typically consists of three components: the product catalog, the shopping cart, and the checkout/payment system. The product catalog is the component that displays the items you have for sale on the website. The shopping cart system is the component that allows your customers to select products by clicking to "add items to cart," and the checkout/payment system is the component that allows the customer to complete the checkout process and pay for their purchase with a credit card (or in some cases an electronic check). It is the checkout/payment component that communicates with the gateway system to complete the transaction.

Adding a shopping cart system to your website can be a simple or highly complex task, depending on the system you select. The cost of shopping cart software ranges from free (for simplistic form-based systems) to very expensive. Which shopping cart system is best for your business depends on a number of factors, including the product you're selling, the depth of your product line, the purchase options you wish to offer customers, the inventory control functionality, and the extent of automation you desire.

There are numerous companies who can assist in the setup of your shopping cart and online credit card payment system. These companies typically charge several hundred to several thousand dollars for their services, but like anything you get what you pay for, so always use a company with good references in this area. When you're dealing with something as important as credit card processing and cash flow, bite the bullet and get it done right the first time. The money you spend now will be returned many times in increased sales volume from credit card customers.

The most important thing to remember when setting up an online payment system is this: online it's all about security and privacy. Though online credit card processing has been around for years there are still many people who are uncomfortable giving their credit card number online. These are the same folks who do not hesitate to give their credit card number over the phone or hand their credit card to a waiter who disappears with it for ten minutes. Online credit card processing is much less susceptible to fraud and abuse than of those scenarios.

An “affiliation” is a relationship (an agreement) between two parties in which one party sells the products or services of the other in exchange for a commission. A good online affiliation program, even with a competitor, can supercharge sales. The product owner wins with additional sales and the affiliate wins by receiving a commission.

The affiliate does not have to create or transport the product that is sold, or even collect the money. This is all provided by the owner of the product. This is a huge advantage for the affiliate because startup costs are low. The beginning affiliate need primarily only focus on product promotion. In many case, the owner even supplies the affiliate with marketing information.

For sale of goods over the internet, the affiliate provides a URL hyperlink for the customer to click on. This hyperlink links to the website of the owner of the product and has a special code so that the affiliate will get credited when the sale goes through. The credit can range from to 50 percent (or higher) commission, depending on the affiliation agreement.

Some ways for an affiliate to increase sales include:

1) Offer something for free in exchange for the email address. People love to get free stuff and if they like what they get, they may reciprocate at a later time with a purchase.

2) Capture the email addresses to an “opt-in” list. From that list, send repeated emails to increase product awareness and to eventually trigger sales.

3) Market unique products with unique web sites. This provides product focus.

4) Include testimonials from real customers. (Be sure to get the customer’s permission first.)

Advantages for the affiliate include:

1) Low startup costs. The other party develops and produces the product.

2) No inventory. The other party manages that.

3) No handling of the product. The other party transfers the product to the customer.

4) No order processing. The other party sets up the merchant accounts and collects the customer’s money.

5) No shipping costs. The other party gets the product to the customer.

6) No downstream warranty costs. The other party handles all customer commitments.

7) If the product doesn’t sell, dump it and move to something else.

The main advantage for the producer (the other party in the affiliation relationship) is increased sales through increased product exposure.

Running an online business means depending on website visitors and online sales.

Online businesses usually try to replace every possible interaction among the seller and the buyer with automated functions. They try to provide customers with functionalities to search through products, change their attributes, inform themselves of features, add products to virtual shopping baskets and at the end – automatically check out and pay.

The whole process is dependent upon the credibility of your company in your customers’ eyes, their ability to find the desired product and make the purchase decision using the available information. According to this, the most important variable is your ability to anticipate their needs, provide the required information and reinforce credibility through the buying process.

Why not take things into your own hands?

Why not help your visitors and interact with them while buying and making decisions?

Why not be there for providing more information?

Why not show them that you care?

And why not do all this with the greatest of ease?

All those things can be done by using live chat support software. It will give your website the charm of the traditional store and you can “walk” with your customer through the site and give assistance when needed.

What can you improve by using live chat support?

You can help your customers to:

• find relevant information quickly on your e-commerce website;
• get additional information about your products and services;
• make quicker decisions when choosing products, by asking them certain questions and offering the best-suited product;
• reassure themselves about the trustworthiness of the website;
• and make the check-out and payment processes a ‘painless’ experience.

Being well dressed is not about wearing the latest fashions; it is about knowing yourself and the styles that look best on you regardless of the latest trends. Keeping up with the latest trends is not only time consuming and costly but hard work. What does it take to dress well? Having lots of money? Well, that helps but most of all it takes organization, knowing yourself and your body and taking the time to get it right.

The boom in online shopping comes as the traditional High Street had a mixed experience over the Christmas period.

While many companies, such as Marks & Spencer and Tesco, enjoyed excellent sales, others such as Next, Body Shop and HMV had a tough time.

HMV and fellow music retailer MVC have also complained about the impact of online sales on their businesses.

IMRG chief executive James Roper said it was time for High Street retailers to make all their product ranges available online, and not just a limited number of items.

Of those retailers that have embraced the internet, Tesco said a record one million customers bought through its website in November and December, while department store John Lewis recorded online and catalogue sales of more than £100m in 2005.

The internet has been doing wonders for people’s wallets for years. In almost every case items that you can purchase in a local store can be found online for less. Designer clothes are no exception and there are literally hundreds of e-commerce web sites that will be more than happy to sell you everything you need for your wardrobe at considerable savings compared to what you’ll pay at the local shopping centre. In many cases you can get free shipping as well.

It won’t only help you find the latest cheap fashion styles but also the much sought after designer labels that are nearly impossible to find in the UK shops. Those like Abercrombie and Fitch, American Eagle, Hollister, Von Dutch, Juicy Couture and many other fashionable American brands that can normally only be bought on a trip to the states can now be found on the internet.

But don’t worry if you’re thinking you still have to purchase from an American online store, with those expensive shipping costs and delayed delivery, as the top labels are finally hitting our shores from websites like www.stand-out.net which offer these hard to find labels and the other top designer brands all at discount prices. Launched just a year ago, Stand-out.net boasts a large selection of designer labels cheaper than other places and including the latest brands including Diesel, Hugo Boss, Armani, Moschino, Replay and the hard to get American brands. Offering a huge range of current and harder-to-find styles, Stand-Out.net has developed into a website you are sure to find something you like at cheap prices.