The next method is social marketing. This includes things such as posting on forums, being active on Facebook & creating like pages for your niches, creating hubs and posts in article directories, giving away free eBooks in joint venture giveaways, connecting with online reporters and giving out press releases, and most importantly, building and communicating with your mailing list.
The advantage of social marketing is that it can go viral which means a sudden boost in new members on your mailing list. You also are not reliant on search engines for your earnings. Google often changes its algorithms, so you never know when your #1 page may drop off the face of the earth for an unknown period of time.
As you may be able to tell already, like most people, I am rather risk averse and do not like to depend on services which I cannot control. Just as in your other investments, diversification is an important aspect of Internet Marketing. However, as a beginner, it is most important to first make money before worrying about diversification!
Finally, once you get ranked in google or have some members on your list, you will need to start promoting products that people are interested in to start making money. This is the easy part.