Receiving phone calls and emails is something I handle every day of every week. Individuals write to me often on the advice of programs they join, or from finding me in the search engines. They come to me for clarification on how to market and advertise online.

Often the case is that the person making contact has joined a program designed specifically to address the questions they are asking me. In the back of my brain, I'm often thinking, "What's not right with this scenario?"

A program - membership or otherwise - must have a few fundamentals to be considered legitimate online. It must give you something in return for you giving someone money. It's that simple. There must be an equitable exchange - information, software, products - something that says you are getting value for your money.

As you explore all your various choices online, when it comes to picking a membership (or product or service), ask yourself (at a minimum) these two questions:

1. What is the program giving you in return for your money?

2. Is there more to the program than just telling others about it?

Here's a typical scenario painted for me: I'm contacted only to find out the caller or emailer has no real idea about what they joined!

Sad but true. Somehow, somewhere along the lines of reading an action packed and powerful sales letter, the hunter forgot what he or she was hunting for - direction to help him or her build their own business online.

Conversely, the other scenario is the hunter had no intention of building a business. He or she was merely looking for an "easier road." Find something to promote and tell others. This creates a problem though, you are an affiliate only and not the owner of the membership or product.

But it doesn't stop there. The problem compounds itself because, in their rush to tell others, the hunter (who has by now become a membership member) skips straight to the "here's your affiliate url to give to others." No reading takes place, no educating oneself on the fine points of what the program (membership or not) is about.

Simply put... the details are completed avoided. It's not hard to pinpoint which category I'm talking or writing to... someone really wanting to make their dream of making money online a reality or someone hoping to get by on the bare minimum of knowledge.

My advise is simple and even easy to follow. When you join any membership site or buy any product online re-read the sales page. If you can lift out the "here's how to make money" part, and still have lots of valuable reasons for joining remaining that's the program for you!

If the allure of making money is the only reason for parting with your own, think it through carefully. If you're not one for researching so that at a minimum you can put your own carefully crafted advertisements together, and you think promoting it will be a walk in the park (and you don't have an active mailing list) your job will not be an easy one. Do-able only if you're willing to work very hard promoting something you know nothing about.

In a nutshell, you join programs and memberships, even those whose sole purpose appears to be making money just for spreading the word about it because you are smart enough to know that morally you have an obligation to find out what it is you will be telling others about. If you can't explain in a simple email or phone call what it is you've joined, you are not ready to share it with others. You can't sell what you don't know. People can sense the difference.