John Gokongwei is an entrepreneur who owns one of the top corporations in the Philippines. His is an inspiring story. Here are some excerpts:

…”I was no more than a student then, at San Carlos University in Cebu, when my father died suddenly. It left me, the eldest, the responsibility of taking care of my mother and five siblings. That was tough for someone who was 13. Creditors had just seized our home and business and I had no experience with earning a living.”

…”My day began at 5 in the morning. I would load my bicycle with soap, thread, and candles, and then bike to neighboring towns to sell my goods. On market days, I would rent a stall, lay out the goods from the bike, and make about 20 pesos a day, enough for me to survive and to buy even more goods for next time.”

…”But I chose to live my life unafraid even during times when I WAS afraid. I discovered that opportunities don’t find you. You find your opportunities.“

…”Call it trite – but, believe me, success CAN BE ACHIEVED through hard work, frugality, integrity, responsiveness to change – and most of all boldness to dream. These have never been just easy slogans for me. I have lived by them. I hope that many of you in this room will some day choose to be entrepreneurs. Choose to be an entrepreneur because then YOU create value.”

Inspiring isn’t it? You can read the rest of his speech here.

Many people go into internet marketing hoping to amass a fortune right from the comfort of their homes. Many enter this field hoping to get rich quick after buying a program or an ebook. And who can blame them? The internet is awash with overhyped sales pages promising they could earn this much in a ridiculously small amount of time. Indeed, one can make money on the internet. But the time and effort involved in achieving this is not as realistic as the sales pages might claim.

I’m not saying that these programs do not work. Some of them have sound business models. But the problem is that those who buy these programs are led to believe that making money online is easy. The lure of plug and play and automatic income is irresistible to newbie internet marketers, and therein lies the problem. Many who buy these programs are full of enthusiasm at first. But after a month or so without seeing any monetary results, they hang up their computers and come up with a conclusion that it was all a scam, which is an unfair conclusion since one can really make money online, and some of these programs are sound.

A beginner in online marketing should adopt a mindset that what he is doing now is something that will reward him in the future. Many feel that they have failed if they did not make this much money in x amount of time, and they give up after that. I compare this to planting a seed. It may not benefit me now if I plant it, but given time and effort, this seed will grow and benefit me in the future. And the more seeds I plant, the more rewards I will reap tomorrow. If you would read a biography of any successful entrepreneur, they would say that it took them years to succeed in what they were doing. And majority of them would say that they have failed many times. There is not one entrepreneur who would say that he achieved success overnight.

An online business is just that. It is a business. It is no different from any other physical business, except all transactions and business activities are occurring online. And no business has ever achieved success without an investment of time and effort.