Helping offline businesses that want to market themselves online is a big and growing realm for Internet marketers, but it should be an even bigger opportunity for many people who work in offline jobs full-time. In many, if not most industries there are a number of salespeople and consultants who deal with a great number of businesses all operating within one offline niche.

Commissioned salespeople, agents, jobbers, wholesalers, suppliers (especially entrepreneurs like printers, etc), media advertising reps, brokers, bookkeepers – all sorts of offline jobs give the employees the perfect opportunity to also represent and promote online marketing services. In many instances all they need do is find online marketers who offer online promotional services to offline businesses and then make a deal with them. The employee is calling on offline businesses all day, either in person or via the phones, and can mention that the services are available if their contacts want to take advantage of it. When any contact shows an interest, the employee simply turns them over to the Internet marketer for followup and they split any resultant income according to whatever their deal is.

For some of these people, especially those in entrepreneurial positions, it’s important that they themselves use the social media and social networking sites effectively too. In those cases, it may prove prudent to educate themselves in how effective online campaigns are promoted and start building their own social network and social media strategies, not only to boost their own sales but to be able to offer those services to their existing clients as well. And in extremely competitive fields of offline business, being able to add social media promotions as a bonus can often sway a potential client into your camp instead of those who can’t offer this additional benefit. After all, firms will always seek out those businesses and individuals you can help them, and their bottom line, the most!

Fortunately, it’s becoming easier and easier to learn effective social media and social networking strategies, and social media marketing can bring heavy-duty benefits to even the newest of practitioners compared to competitors who aren’t using the social sites. In fact, companies who have websites and don’t support them with social media campaigns will be buried quickly by those who do, in my opinion. Having been online full-time for 14 or 15 years now, I’m quite aware that one has to stay active online utilizing the current ‘hot’ strategies to continue to benefit from the web, unlike offline media where the same newspapers rule the same markets for 100 years, TV stations have dominated their markets for 50 years or radio stations for 30 or 40 years. In fact, industry statistics show that TV and Radio stations are folding at a rate of one a week in North America, and newspapers are suffering the same fate world-wide as their traditional audiences are turning more and more to the internet for their information, including local news and events.

And it’s just that local online market that the offline reps should be tackling. Inexpensive how-to tutorials like Local Internet Marketing Empire and High Profile Social Media can teach you everything you need to get started, while specific site guides like Advanced Marketing On Twitter and FaceBook Ad Explosion can help you to truly excel in social media marketing. And since all of the above combined would require less than $100 invested to own all 4, not only is the entry cost not an issue for most people but it’s easy to see how just one social media campaign would cover any amount you have invested in your skills training.

In these tough economic times sales are down all over the place, meaning especially tough times for commissioned salespeople, entrepreneurs and other offline workers who are paid on performance. It’s nice to know our online industry is able to help out by providing a reasonably easy way for you to supplement your offline income while building your own business at the same time!

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