What a loaded question! Let's narrow that down a bit and take it from the perspective of someone who wants to work from home and make money online in a home business. That will make it an easier question to answer.
Let's assume you've never had a website, don't know how to get a merchant account, don't know html, and are pretty much stuck with being an expert on sending and receiving email.
What's there for you to do online to make money? Lots, in fact! These days are not at all like a couple of years ago or even six months ago. If I only had all the opportunities to make money online when I started marketing!
Here is a list of things you can do with just a website and a hosting account today:
Sell affiliate products (products like reports, ebooks, hard goods of every conceivable make, model, size, shape and function, and much, much more). Sell services (do you know how big a business being a Virtual Assistant is these days? It's quite amazing what you can do for people without ever meeting them face-to-face, anywhere in the world!) Online auctions (Ebay has made thousands and thousands of people full-time incomes from auctioning collectibles, antiques, and even brand new equipment and gadgets of all imaginable types. You name it, it has been sold on Ebay!) Membership sites: Know of any groups of people that would love to get insider information on virtually any topic? You could make money online with a membership site!
The list is a long one and one I am not prepared to detail here. You have found your way onto the net and if you have been surfing for very long at all you know it is a gigantic super shopping mall. Who to you think is making the most money online? Aside from big corporations, most of the web is made up of sites put up by little businesses people work from home.
I sell information and I love it. Most of the products I sell are other merchants' products. I just drive traffic to my site, provide information, and point to relevant products related to the information I provide people looking for a way to make money online. I love helping people make their first few sales.
After that, they are always hooked and cannot do enough to learn everything there is to know about how to make money online. Many people I have worked with now have a couple to several websites selling everything from reports to hard goods that can be shipped direct to their customers. Most people start out to make money online as affiliates of certain products or authors. This is a great way to get your feet wet and learn what making money online is all about. People then either work to create their own products (which they get 100% of the profits from) or expand their website into other related niches.
Darrell Knox is a writer and entrepreneur with 15 years of home business and marketing experience.Website: http://cgi.tripod.com/lazaraus26/cgi-bin/index.pl