Want To Know How To Start An Online Business?
by Steven Downward in An Entrepreneurs Stories
OK, so I’m guessing that you want to know how to start an online business? So that is what we’re going to get into here; you understanding how to start an online business for yourself so that you can have the freedoms to do all of those things that you really want to do. Now let’s get into it.
The first thing that you need to know and understand when starting an online business is that businesses, I mean real businesses, are not some get rich quick or make a fast buck. They’re about building an asset that will pay you for a lifetime if you want them to. It’s going to take some time and effort on your part to get it up and running but as an entrepreneur you will understand that and will want to keep moving forward with it.
Now that that’s all said and done, let’s get into sharing with you how to start an online business.
In reality, there are only three things that you will need to do and have in-order to make some cash off of the internet. These three things are: a product, a sales site, and your marketing. I know that this sounds almost too basic but it’s the truth. This is all that you will need to start a business online.
So I wanted to get into each of these so that you can really understand what you will need to do to get your business off the ground and running. 
How To Start An Online Business: Part 1 – The Product
Every business on the planet has some sort of a product. This is the item or service that the business sells in-order to generate revenue (cash). With an online business, you can pretty much choose to sell anything that you want; right from a widget to cars to informational products to a professional service of some type.
Now here’s the thing with the internet though, people come to the internet to learn things and to gather information, so what do you think sells the best? You guessed it, information products. But that doesn’t mean that your product has to be an information product. You might have already developed a product of your own and you now want to sell this via the internet. This we will be getting into more with the second part so stay tuned.
If you don’t already have a product, do not fear, there are thousands of people that will pay you to sell their “pre-packaged” products. Have you ever heard of a thing called “Affiliate Marketing“? Affiliate marketing is a way that you can make money by promoting other peoples products. The great thing about doing affiliate marketing is that you don’t have to deal with any customer issues, collection of money, sales site, or anything else that is really involved in making the sale. All you need to do is get people to a site that they provide for you and then collect the checks. (I have a video walking through this entire process at the bottom of this post)
So, get a product. This is the first and probably the most important piece in understanding how to start an online business. So make one yourself, buy the rights to one, or become an affiliate of someone else’s, just get some sort of a product.
How To Start An Online Business: Part 2 – The Sales Site
This is one of those things that is rather obvious. You will need to have a site that does the selling for you. See this is one of the most beautiful things about the internet. You have a web page that does the selling for you. A page that does not take time off or go on holidays; it runs 24 hours a day 7 days a week. Basically, you have a sales person that never stops working for you. This is really cool.
When people come online wanting to start an online business, they feel that their sales page needs to be some flashy looking site with all of their products on it so that the visitor, your potential customer, can choose what they want to buy. This really does not work on the internet all that well. People tend to have ADHD to the extreme when they come surfing online. If you give them too many options they will get confused and then just click away to some other page.
What works really well online is a page that looks more like an article than an actual sales page. It’s pretty plain and boring and there really is nowhere for the person to go but either back or buy, and we want the latter of the two. You can see how my sales process works at www.OnlineBusinessPuzzle.com
One more thing I needed to mention. Remember when I talked about affiliate marketing and how it’s a bit easier? What happens with affiliate marketing is the person that created the product and gave you the ability to market the product takes care of this whole step. They build the whole thing for you and then they just give you a link to the sales page for you to promote. (Again I will walk you through this in the video below, just keep reading down)
How To Start An Online Business: Part 3 – The Marketing
When learning how to start an online business, you will need to spend a good chunk of the time learning how to do internet marketing correctly. Something like 98% of the people on the internet really have no idea as to how to effectively market their business online. Because of this, they are literally loosing out on thousands and thousands of dollars of lost revenue. So don’t make this mistake.
With the internet, there really is a lot of different ways that you could market your business. But the big ones are: SEO (Search Engine Optimization), PPC (Pay Per Click), Social Media, Videos, and Articles. I talk about each of these different types of marketing in different posts here on my blog so I’m not going to get into specifics for each form.
But I do want to add a few of different things about marketing online as a whole.
1. Focus on type of marketing to start off with. Don’t try to be the jack of all trades and do all the different types at the same time. What you will find is that you will not get anywhere and you will just get frustrated and eventually quit.
2. Marketing online can cost money or it can be free. If you choose to do paid marketing, make sure that you set yourself a budget on how much you’re willing to spend in any given month. I have seen a lot of people bet the farm in their first month and found themselves to have no return and no more cash.
3. Act quickly. The faster that you start your marketing and the more you get out there, the quicker it will be till you start turning a profit. So get things on the road ASAP.
How To Start An Online Business: Tying It All Together
Now I know that this has been long (way longer than the majority of my other posts) but I feel I just need to add a couple more thing so that you can better understand how to start an online business.
Firstly, you don’t need to do all of this on your own. You can hire out experts to do some or all of this for you. A great place to go is Elance.com or WarriorForum.com. You can find experts in just about anything you might need from these 2 locations.
Secondly, remember, “Rome Was Not Built In A Day” and neither will your business. Give your business the time that it needs to grow and to develop. Once you have it rocking and rolling, there is very little that can stop it.
Now I hope that this helps to clarify a bit as to how to start an online business. I know that there is so much that we did not get into in this post so please Subscribe to my blog so that you will benefit from me continually teaching people how to start an online business.
Talk to you soon
Steven Downward
PS: If you have any questions, comments or anything that you would like to ask me, please just write them in the comment section below and I will be happy to answer them for you. I might even do a blog post answering the question so please, ASK AWAY.
PPS: Here is that video that I talked about. This video not only will walk you through how to start an online business but it will show you how to do it without you having to spend a dime to get the business up and running.
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2 Responses to “Want To Know How To Start An Online Business?”
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brandi horn
09. Aug, 2011
i wan to start an online bakers boutique selling everything from cake and cupcake stands, cake and cupcake toppers, designer paper straws, paper lanterns and pom poms, party banners etc…where can I find the right suppliers for me? are my products available to order through catalogues, online or trade shows? eventually I would love to open a store front as well. any tips? thanks
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16. Sep, 2010
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