Much has been written about how to start and run a successful Internet business. In many cases there is so much advice it is difficult to boil it down to specific action items. In this article I want to give you 4 rules you should be following to launch a successful Internet business start up.

1. Choose a profitable niche. Niche marketing is where you take a broad based theme and narrow it down.

The goal when choosing a profitable niche is to find something you enjoy in a market where people are currently spending money. This gives you a much better chance of succeeding when you can make some of those paying customers yours.

If you have an area of expertise you may be able to turn that into a profitable Internet business. If you have a hobby or something that you have a passion for you may be able to make it profitable as well.

Hanging out in discussion forums is a good place to see how people are making money online. You can also go to Google Trends or Click Bank and determine what some of the trends in the marketplace are.

2. Set up a blog. This is the fastest and best way to promote your business online. Your blog becomes your website and offers many benefits in terms of ease of operation.

Blogs can really make an impression on a website visitor. Look at some of the blogs of your competitors to get ideas of things you can do in terms of video marketing, graphics, and so on.

3. Monetize it with affiliate products. Google Adsense is a good affiliate product to start with. Adding Google ads to your blog is easy to do. It is also very profitable in terms of getting paid by the click as you begin to get traffic to it.

Adding banners from affiliate programs to your blog is a good thing to do as well. Banner advertising does work and visitors will click on those ads. Every time a purchase is made for one of the products you are promoting you earn a commission.

4. Spend 90% of your time on traffic generation. Once you have everything in place you should work on getting visitors to your new site.

Incorporate as many free and paid advertising methods as you possibly can. Concentrate on getting backlinks around targeted keyword phrases for long term traffic.

In summary these are 4 rules to launch a successful Internet business start up. If you choose a profitable niche, set up a blog, monetize it correctly, and then concentrate on marketing your new business, you will be successful.