When I first started out, it ticked all the boxes. And I jumped in feet first. Great, I thought. I’ve started. This is easy. And so began an interest in Internet Marketing, or Information Publishing as some people describe it.

That feeling lasted for about a week.

Then, suddenly, I was swamped. There were SOOooo many things to learn, things to do to get up and running before I even got to square zero, new words, no definitions, new actions on the computer, jumping off from what felt like the top board, when I should be at the shallow end of the pool, sites I’d never heard of and now needed to be able to navigate around. Yes life on the control panel side is different from the happy browser clicking her way around the internet…. With only a few hours a couple of evenings a week, the course zoomed out ahead of me. And me, I was still at the starting post working out which way to face, staring at glitches and stopped by the hitches, confused by the stitches it took to keep it together.

Suddenly a year went by. I didn’t quite make it to the end of the course. But I didn’t give up on it, dipped in and out of it, slipped around and about in it, picked up bits of it….always came back to it…maybe one day…

But today was a good day. I got back to my blog, poshed up a post, published it promptly. Did some work on the course. Wow, that wasn’t so tough.

Found some later lessons, took a sneak peak, didn’t collapse in a heap.

Gosh, now that makes more sense. I can see where I am going and how to get there. And now I can see how I can use it and make it my own.

It’s exciting and looks like good fun. I can’t wait to wake up tomorrow and do some more.

There are so many internet marketing websites and “gurus” out there that it’s hard to know where to start, who to trust, who to go to.

For some people, it’s the very real fear of being scammed. Even a small amount of money can be a lot to the person spending it and it can add up if it happens more than once.

Then there is the ever-present risk of what happens to your personal details after you’ve  entered your name and email address, or your card or other important ID details on a page. It’s been known to happen that a person started to fill in a form with email adress and name, then changed their mind and left the page before they pressed submit or to confirm those details, came out of the page totally, only to find that their  details had already been captured and the site was using them.  Next thing they started receiving mailings and offers from the site which they hadn’t actually joined.

Then there are the spammy emails that suddenly start appearing in your inbox, and you wonder how they got your details and who maybe sold on your details…

So, is there somewhere you CAN go that you can rely on? Somewhere you can find out  find out who other people have learned is trustworthy?  Which products are worth buying?

There is one place I go when I want to find out more about a program or product and see reviews by people who have bought the product or worked with the person. It’ s IM Report Card.com

The reviews are by real people, and the sites and products are graded on a simple A+, A-, B+, B-, C+, C- scale with the reason why the reviewer thought they were good or not.

You can make up your own mind based on people’s real experience with the product being reviewed or the marketer who created it. The reviews are independent and I’ve found it very helpful and useful, especially when I first got on line. It helped me sort out who to listen to and where to spend my hard earned cash for good value and who to leave alone.

There are other interesting features and sections. Time spent here is well worth it.

IM Report Card.com  Check it out here and find out for yourself.