If you’ve never had much to do with share trading, you might be surprised to find that you cannot buy and sell shares yourself. To have any kind of investment portfolio you must rely on the services of a stock broker to buy and sell your shares.

There are two main types of stockbrokers. One will buy and sell whatever shares whenever you tell him. He is referred to as a non-advisory stockbroker. While the lower fees charged may seem attractive, there is no surety that your investments will be good ones - unless you have done your research and know which companies are the likeliest to perform well.

There are two ways to contact your non-advisory stock broker and that is via the telephone and via the Internet. Of the two, the Internet is the cheapest as you simply go to the website provided and type in all the details of your stock broking wishes. They are then put into the loop and the stock broker carries out your wishes. For a telephone service you pay a little more, but are able to contact the stockbroker and tell him personally what you want to do with your share trading.

The other type of stockbroker is called a full service stockbroker. He will advise you on what is a good or a bad investment, and then trade as you tell him to. An advisory stockbroker does charge higher fees, but his advice is for the most part well worth considering.

There are also two main types of investing. One is to purchase certain shares and keep them over several years until their value has increased, or simply keep them to enjoy the dividend each year. The other is to buy and sell quickly - hopefully for a profit. The latter choice is the riskier, as no one can adequately predict whether the value of specific shares will go up on down at any given time. While it is possible to make good money doing this - if you are lucky - it is also possible to make losses very easily.

All investing has risk, but diversifying widely and taking notice of a professional stockbroker’s advice will help to mitigate it to some extent. It takes time to learn all the ins and outs of share trading, so while you venture on your journey, be sure to heed the advice of others who’ve gone before you.

Everyone who trades on the stock market - and many who don’t - will be aware of the highs and lows experienced. When the price of shares is soaring everyone is happy, but when they start to tumble investors may start to get a little panicky and want to get out of that particular investment. Online investing is a bit like riding in the Tour de France - there are many ups and downs, but if you stick with it through the hard times, you’ll come out a winner in the end.

Even eventual winner Carlos Sastre knows that he will not win every stage of the Tour de France. He makes allowances for that and fixes his sight firmly on the end result. Sure, getting to wear that yellow jersey before crossing over the finish line might feel good. But it is not the most important part of the whole picture. Sastre trained hard and learned the correct strategies to come out winner in the long run. That’s what investors need to do when share trading.

Think of share trading as the course Carlos Sastre rides in the Tour de France. Some days there are steep mountains to ride up and other days the terrain flattens out to level - good, easy riding. So in share trading there will be the good times with shares soaring to new heights and hard times when things plunge steeply. Then there will be those times when trading levels out and there are no steep plunges. When Carlos gets to the top of his mountain, he expects the course to flatten out a bit before going down the other side. He doesn’t have a panic attack and stop riding when the going gets tough.

So with online trading there will ascents, levels and plunges over the course. If you have a financial goal, don’t start to panic when the plunge starts. Share trading will always have its ups and downs, but overall, the steady investor comes out on top.