The goal that motivates most people who long to be called an entrepreneur is they want to be their own boss. I have been my own boss for 13 years. I worked on my own for a number of years, but I longed to have a business where I had employees that could make me money while I worked on more "strategic" things.

I started a contracting business. I ran it from my home. I no longer had to drive to an office and was around my kids much more. The freedom it brought me felt good but it created a whole new barrage of headaches and presented me with a very costly learning curve.

I had to become a salesman, accountant, foreman, strategic planner and, occasionally, a worker bee. Once the business started going well, I started hiring sales people. They all wanted to make 100k, but were only willing to do about 30k worth of work. I soon realized that I was the best salesman, but if I spent too much time on sales, operations and other areas suffered. After 7 years in the contracting business, I started looking for something that was less stressful and hopefully more profitable.

One thing that I had been very intrigued with was selling and marketing on the internet. I am an avid reader of business magazines, and I frankly get tired of reading about a 20 something person that has become a gazillionaire through the internet. I had no idea at all how Google, e-bay or Craig's list works, but I thought I should look into it a little.

Now part of my trepidation about the internet stems from the fact that I'm 45 years old. The internet seemed complicated to me. A thought that continually nagged me, however, is that if a 20 something could figure it out, I probably could.

I spent about 18 months looking at scores of internet marketing plans and products. I soon learned that there were almost as many scams as there were opportunities. I also realized that while there are an endless number ways to try to make money on-line, the marketing of your product is the key to true success.

I then started looking at the people that called themselves internet mentors. I realized that if I wanted to be successful in making money on line, I had to ally myself with someone who knew what they were doing, knew how to teach, were willing to work with me and had a product that I could be excited about.

I became convinced that I could be successful on line. The internet did not overwhelm me like I thought it would.

I studied and learned about article marketing, pay per click advertising, forum advertising and many other methods.

At the end of my 18 month journey, I jumped in with both feet. I worked at it every chance I could, and in about one month I was able to call myself a full time internet marketer. Now I could work when I wanted and wherever I wanted. I could take a vacation without worrying about my customers or corporate cash flow. All I needed was a cell phone and a laptop and I could continue to make money on line and grow my business.

You might be wondering what I did with my contracting business? I shut it down. I kept some of the cool toys that the business owned and offered my employees an opportunity to work with me on-line.

They haven't taken me up on it yet, but they are young, and perhaps they'll come around.

Now, I don't have employees. I don't have to deal with customers or vendors like I used to, and the people are much more exciting to work with. I am both their mentor and student, but we all share a common goal of mutual success. My level of job satisfaction is immensely improved, my stress level is almost gone, and my family sure notices the difference.

If you decide to embark on an internet marketing career, it will be hard work and there will be some risk, but if you stick with it until you are successful, you will never look back. And the coolest thing about it is that internet marketing is not really that difficult. The tools that are available for on line marketers are almost dummy proof. With the proper mentor, some patience and hard work will bring you success.