Been trying to do business online awhile? Then you already know it ain’t a bed of roses every day. Here’s my personal list of the 8 biggest irritations about doing business online.

#1. People who are looking for a sure-fire “get rich quick” scheme.
I don’t know about you, but the well-off people I know worked their behinds off for their money (unless they were lucky enough to have a rich old aunt kick the bucket in their favor). Personally I’ve never yet met a person who has actually gotten rich from a “get rich quick” scheme, but I’ve encountered THOUSANDS who tanked trying to get rich without work. P.T. Barnum was right about a sucker being born every minute. The Internet has empowered these people. They literally can’t wait to get online to get taken advantage of. It’s sickening. You want to get rich? Work!

#2. Expecting to create a profitable online business without making any investment.
These people often overlap with the group above. They’re the really gullible ones. Despite massive evidence to the contrary, they expect to go online, invest NOTHING, and make their fortune lickety-split. It NEVER happens. Having encountered a ton of these people, however, I’ve become a critic of the educational system which produced them. What are we teaching people in schools that leads them to think that merely showing up is going to make them rich?

#3. Expecting to create a business without knowing the products.
How many times have you asked someone for information about the products sold by their company and gotten a bumbling, non-sensical response? The sad truth is that the first thing people ought to know about their businesses–namely what they’re selling and what’s so good about it–is actually the last thing you can get an intelligent response about. How can people expect to prosper selling things they cannot explain and know so little about? Yet that’s precisely what far too many people online are doing!

#4. Changing your online business over and over again.
I know a woman who’s into a new online “business” every few DAYS. One day she’s selling herbal products…the next day it’s online services…then it’s fake noble titles. She cannot decide what business she’s in and because she’s afraid she’s missing out on a couple of nickels somewhere, she jumps from “business” to “business” faster than a flea jumping onto a new dog. Her sales are pathetic, of course, her credibility non-existent, but her unshakable optimism just cannot be dented, despite the mountains of evidence that she’s a fool. Lord, spare me from those with the ability for unlimited self-deception, especially when they keep emailing me with their latest and greatest “sure-thing” discovery.

#5. The Non-Readers.
The Internet, the premier means for transferring information cheaply worldwide, has exacerbated the trend towards non-reading. We see this all the time at Worldprofit, Inc. We spend huge amounts of time and money creating user-friendly information. All too often, however, a dealer or customer will sniff at this information, find out that to know what it says you actually have to READ it, then loudly scream, “Wolf!” by emailing that they cannot understand what they have never made any attempt to learn. Folks, like it or not, the Internet is new technology and you’ve got to allow for a learning curve to master it. There’s just no way around this. I doubt that anyone would have arrived at their college freshman year and said, “Hey, I don’t want to read all these books. Just tell me what’s in ’em.” Yet that’s precisely how plenty of knuckleheads approach the ‘Net.

#6. The people who know what they need but won’t get it.
For years, I’ve been advocating that if people want to succeed online they need things like their own domain, a listserver so that they can communicate with their prospects at the touch of a button, a sales manager so they can handle all prospect follow-ups, etc. These investments are minor and they’re essential for online success. However, time after time I encounter the wiseguys who think they can succeed without having or using any of the necessary tools. Usually in hot pursuit of the latest “get rich quick” scheme, these puppies are determined to achieve success without bothering with any of the necessary success tools.

#7. Newbies who know it all.
Since 1993 I’ve been slogging daily on the ‘Net helping to build my business, and I’ve never allowed myself the arrogance of thinking I know it all; indeed, I’ve been humbled by how much there is to learn online, approaching the problem of mastering it one step at a time, one day at a time. It’s the exact reverse of the hotshot know-it-alls who have been on the ‘Net 5 minutes, know everything, and dismiss the notion that there may actually be something they don’t know with an irritating wave of the hand. “What, me work?” they seem to say. These people are frequently young, male, and often make me want to take a long, hot bath after encountering them to rinse off the stench of stupidity and irresponsibility they emit.

#8. People who lie about money.
The biggest taboo of our times is not sex, but money. In our culture, money and what it buys defines who we are. To increase our perceived standing either means getting more money–or lying about what we’ve got. The Internet, with all its anonymity, has made it easier to lie about money. People lie at the drop of a hat about what they want and their ability to pay for it. People think nothing about lying; they see no negative consequences to whatever they say and so carry on merrily saying whatever comes into their heads, no matter that not a single word of it is true. To counter this trend, business people like me have to assume that every single person we encounter is a liar until proven otherwise. We have to run our businesses from a defensive posture, wondering who will do what to threaten the stability of our enterprise. Only the naive and foolish approach people as if they are honest, reliable, credible, and trust-worthy. The rest of us have to live each day in a state of permanent wariness. It’s a helluva way to live, but necessary to online business success.

Well, there I’ve said it. There’s more, of course, that needs to be said about the people who make doing business online unnecessarily difficult and unpleasant, but that’s enough for today. If you see yourself in what I’ve written, DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. Bad behaviors are not set in cement. I guess I’m still optimistic enough to think that if one sees them and understands them, one can change them. Right? Or am I being naive?

Dr. Jeffrey Lant is co-founder and CEO of Worldprofit, Inc. at www.worldprofit.com. For free subscriptions to Dr. Lant’s & Worldprofit’s online business newsletters, go to www.worldprofit.com/ezines.