Starting a Business Online
Starting a business online is not much different from starting a business in real life. The process to attract walk-ins is also related to the Internet Marketing process, you must have a good marketing to be able to accomplish this. It could be as simple as a sandwich board outside your store, but it must have a compelling marketing message.

So, how do you go about starting an internet business?

There are many things that correspond to the brick-and-mortar process of starting a business.

List of For Instances on Starting a Business
For instance, you need to make sure you have a good feasibility study done. In other words, is this something that the market has an interest in and are there enough interested eyeballs, bodies, with money that will make this worth creating.

For instance, you need to decide what it will cost to have the business going, irrespective of whether or not you make sales. In other words, how much money will I need to keep the business alive if I don’t have anyone buy anything. This involves the rent, phone, utilities, salaries, taxes, and so on. Online, it would be your hosting fee, your Internet access, and so on.

For instance, you need to determine your costs if you are creating products, selling services, or retailing products. Each one has a different set of requirements. When creating products, both online and offline, you will need more upfront costs to take care of than if you are retailing a product. So, the amount of money you have available will determine which route you can go. We are not talking about having others invest in your venture here because that will also make a difference on the decision.

For instance, will you run the business on your own or will you hire out for some of the areas you aren’t equiped to handle. Will you hire personnel or will you outsource it.
For instance, what type of business entity will you have. This has to do with the type of liability you want to protect yourself for. Corporations and non-corporations are pretty much it. Then you also need to decide what amount of leadership are you willing to share if any. Some corporations will allow one single owner, partnerships will always involve someone else, and “doing-business-as” (dba) will always be the least safe of all business entities.

These are just a few of the items that come to mind.
Let me know if you have other questions that still bug you and we’ll try and get you the answers.
To your success

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• Marketing 2 Women International is Launching Cross Marketing Consortiums in a City Near You. (womenpartner.com)

It’s very interesting but many business owners ignore this when they put together their marketing program. When it comes to online marketing list creation is the mainstay and the main push by many online vendors.  You should seriously consider email marketing as at least one tier of your Internet marketing campaign. Many business owners shy away from email marketing because they believe all email marketing campaigns are purely spam. However, nothing could be further from the truth and not doing this type of marketing can cause your business to lose out on a great deal of business. By not appealing to potential customers via email, your business may lose a great deal of business to competitors who are using email marketing campaigns to reach customers around the world. However, the first step of an email marketing campaign should be creating an email distribution list. We will discuss some popular options for doing this and we’ll help you learn more about what is acceptable and what is not when it comes to email marketing.

Email Marketing

Once you have made the decision to start using email marketing to promote your business your next task will likely be compiling an email distribution list. This is essentially a list of email addresses to which you will email your advertising and promotional materials. One common way to gain a list of email addresses is to purchase a list from distributors. However, this may be a waste of money. Stay away from it.  The problem with purchasing an email list is that you have no way of knowing whether or not the members of the list would have any interest in your products or services. This is very important because while you want to reach a large audience with your email marketing you also want this audience to be members of your overall target audience.

Purchasing Email List

When you purchase an email list you may be sending your email messages to some users who might be interested but this is largely coincidental and is not likely to be well received because the message was not solicited. This would be what I call SPAM! Not worth it.

Online users are very quick to delete materials they believe to be spam without even opening or reading the emails. In fact some Internet service providers include spam filters which may automatically delete your emails if your messages are deemed to be spam. These filters run complex programs on the subject heading and content of the message to determine whether or not it is spam and are quite adept at weeding out spam. Therefore you run the risk of having your email marketing effort turn out to be a complete waste if your message doesn’t get read.

Creating an Email List: A far better Way

A far better way to create an email distribution list for your email marketing campaign is to ask current customers as well as interested potential customers to register with your website to receive additional information and periodic updates about your products and services as well as other information which might be of interest to them. This provides you with a database of email addresses from current customers as well as potential customers who have a genuine interest in your products and services and who are interested in learning more about these products and services.

Offer something that will entice your visitors to subscribe with you:

Content is still king!

Once you have a list of interested customers or potential customers you can send them emails or create  and send them newsletters. These documents should contain a wealth of valuable information as well as a soft sell pitch for your products and services. This information will be valued by the readers and may help even  persuade them to buy your products and services.

PostScript:

You might also want to include useful links to either your website as well as other websites which may be of interest to your readers. Each contact whether it is an email with information or newsletter should also contain a portion which urges the reader to take a specific action such as making a purchase or at least investigating your website offerings further.

Best wishes in your ventures

Does your business already have a website online?

If your business is already marketing your products or services online just by virtue of the fact that you have a website online means that you are marketing online. Having a live website means there is the potential for curious Internet users to access your website. You may not be actively promoting your website but you may still find that your website generates interest in your products despite the lack of promotional endeavors; this is a form of passive marketing.

Forum, Message Board participation, and Signature notation with link back to your website.

If you regularly participate in forums, message boards, and use signature notations on your messages, you are already marketing your website online.  Savvy business owners should realize the importance of participation in industry related message boards to create an interest in their products and services. Combine that with a signature notation linking the post to their website and they will be establishing themselves as knowledgeable about the industry and products they offer. However, even business owners who do not realize this may already be inadvertently enjoying the benefits of Internet marketing which result from message board participation just by doing something they enjoy such as message board participation which they may be doing as a pasttime.

On the technical side, do you research and include keywords relevant to your business or website content?

Business owners who do are already marketing on the Internet by optimizing their website for these keywords. These search engine optimization (SEO) affects the websites whether or not they were even aware of the concept of keyword density and how it can help to SEO a website. Business owners will likely use certain words often depending on the type of products and services they offer just because it is natural and logical to do so. This behind-the-scenes work, can result in search engines boosting your website rankings for these particular keywords whether or not you realize it. The concept of SEO is much more involved and complex than simply using keywords frequently (keyword density) but business owners can gain some benefit just by naturally applying relevant keywords to their website.

Do you solicit feedback from your customers online?

This is yet another example of how business owners may be marketing their business online and not realize it. Most business owners realize the importance of soliciting feedback from customers for business purposes and business owners who offer products online might solicit feedback in the form of online surveys. Although the business owners may be doing this simply for a business purpose, it is another form of online marketing.

Increase your online marketing impact.

This covered several ways in which business owners may already be marketing online but what about business owners who want to have an increased online presence? Business owners who may already be marketing online accidentally may wish to launch a full scale Internet marketing campaign. There are a number of ways to do this, one is to hire a consultant who is already an expert on this area; another is through self-training; another maybe to simply work with mentors. Irrespective of which way you decide to work on, remember, one size does not fit all in online marketing. You must make sure that your marketing fits your target market. Anything else will be a waste of resources, money, and time.

Someone said that politeness isn’t all that’s cracked to be and that was because the person who said that was not polite. So, we tend to avoid that type of individual.

Rude Customer Service tends to do the same for customers.

We go to stores where we feel comfortable and appreciated. Even if we don’t end up spending a dime. Why is it that business owners have a hard time understanding this?

When I go to an organization, be it a retail store, a manufacturing, a service organization, or whatever other type of business it is, two things strike at me immediately after I enter the business, one is how clean the business is and the other is how friendly the organization is. Often, the business is sterile clean and any friendliness there could have been there is also wiped out. That’s usually enough to get me moving as quickly as I can to get out and to avoid dealing with such a business.

It is interesting that many business owners could care less about this and will go to great lengths to emphasize the fact of their rudeness. Interestingly enough, they are the ones typically spending thousands of dollars to attract customers, which they typically do, but aren’t able to translate all that traffic into sales.

Are you a rude business organization?

How easy is it to find out?

There are some very simple ways to do this.

One is to contact the customer who just finished doing business with you and asking.
You will be surprised how much you can find out when you ask the right question. Yes, ask at most two questions, or you will come across as another dreaded poll taker.

Another is to hire someone to do a secret shop for you. You don’t have to pay an arm and a leg to get this done. Simply find a relative, friend, church member, who ever, that you trust, and ask them to go to your store and do a quick overview of their experience. For this, you would have a much more detailed list of items to be on the lookout for, and that should be enough to let you know how your business is perceived in the community.

Another way is to send out a survey to your existing customers and asking them to rate your business on a number of areas. Offer a small gift for anyone who returns those surveys.

Any one of these will be enough to provide you with information on how your business is being perceived by your customers.

Finally, make sure that you treat your employees as you wish they would treat your customers. The rude behavior an employee exhibits is nothing more than the behavior he or she copies from the manager above. GIGO is a computer acronym that stands for garbage in garbage out, so make sure that you are not filling the garbage can.

Remember, a customer who is treated with respect will value that enough to often overlook other issues.

Best wishes on your venture

One of the most powerful images that I came across was that of a thick rope fraying and coming undone. There’s nothing spectacular about a thick rope coming undone. Age will do it, use will do it. But, it is a powerful image nevertheless.

two are better than one

When the rope is intact, it is powerful enough to move a ship, hold a heavy container, or hold something in place. But when it frays, it barely is enough to hold itself.

It is the same for many new businesses. Alone, the owner is often asked to take on many tasks, such as being a marketer, salesman, stockman, artisan, and so on and so forth. Soon, all these demands start shuting down his or her ability to hold the ship together. The business owner is being pulled from all sides and is barely able to hold himself together.

At that point the business owner has a choice, continue on the same path and breakdown altogether or change direction.

Breakdown is easy to figure out: This is the situation where a business owner starts missing deadlines, being unresponsive to customers requests and simply ignoring the basics of business. The “could-care-less” attitude. It is easy to fall into this and it really isn’t something that the business owner planned for but he should have. From this point to closing the business takes very little but may take a long time.

Changing direction is the way to go. When the business owner is looking at what he is planning on doing, part of the planning should be on the management team and part of the planning should be on the operational team.

The management team is that group of people that will help the new business owner reach the next level. This could be a group of advisers or an actual group of professionals hired for specific roles, such as accountants, or lawyers. Insurance broker would also fall on this category. It could be anyone and everyone who is helping with the managing portion of the business.

The management team does not have to be paid up-front and may stay as counselors until the business grows to the point where these advisors can be paid for their time and expertise. But, treat whoever you approach professionally. Don’t just use them and then abuse them by ignoring their services.

The operational team is a little more specific in the sense that they are the ones who will help you create the product, distribute it, and depending on your business, simply generate revenue. These could be artisans, craftsmen, and so on. These will not be able to work on the promise of future payment. As a rule, these individuals work on a per job or per period (hour, day, whatever) basis and depend on their ability to earn their rate to survive. As a business owner it is important that you understand this or you will be fighting a losing battle.

So, how do you acquire your partners?

As far as the management team, you could start by approaching an accountant, your banker, an insurance broker, and an attorney, and discussing with them what your needs will be. Work on this until you find a “kindred soul” some professional that not only understands the small business concept but understands the risks of a small business.

For many of these individuals, what will count is how much they think they are going to be able to make from you. Although there’s nothing wrong with that, you may be better served by someone else, someone who understands what it is like to start a new business and struggle to reach the next level. Keep searching until you find those professionals. Make sure you check your local chamber of commerce or community hall for referrals to these individuals.

As far as the operational team, the artisans, craftsmen, etc, you will need to really work hard at weeding out the ones who are in it for the money and have little professional integrity. These are the ones who quote you for a job without knowing zip about your situation. These are the ones that will be rude, obnoxious, and lack any professional integrity. There are, unfortunately, far too many out there, so you will have to work hard to find the jewels. But, once you do, take good care of them. They will help you succeed.

There’s everything to be gained by taking on partners in these ways and you and your business will benefit as a result. So, don’t run your business alone, make sure you invite others to help you succeed. But, treat those that do help you, as well as you can. They are worth every penny.

Wishing you the best in your ventures

How often have you wished that you could come up with a great sounding title for what you do instead of what you actually do?

“I’m a business owner!”(Said sotto voice)

‘Yeah, sure! Where’s your shop?”

“I work out of my home!”

“How’s the weather?”

Seriously though, don’t you wish people would take you seriously when you say you are a business owner?

I do and one of the things I do that makes a difference to me, at least, is that I (am working on this) consistently do some small step to get closer to my goal of generating a serious income so that I don’t have to justify anything. What you or I do has nothing to do with anyone else other than as a customer or vendor. If you are a customer and are interested in my products or services, you should be concerned primarily on the quality of what I provide and on the reliability of my business. You want to know that I’m going to provide an above average product that will provide you long term satisfaction and that I will be around when you decide you need either more of what I provide and or need support for what I provide.

As a vendor, on the other hand, you should be looking at my ability to pay for what I order from you and that I will be a long term customer.

That should be all that matters.

So, how do we as business owners go about satisfying those goals?

First off, make sure that you are able to deliver and if at all possible, over-deliver, before you even think about opening your doors. Also, make sure that you have made yourself very visible to your customers. you don’t want them to guess where they think you live. Customers or buyers will be very reluctant to part with their money if they don’t know it is going to be returned in some form either product or the service your promised in exchange for the money. So, if you have a website, make sure there is contact information there.

Second, when you enter into a contract with a buyer make sure everyone knows exactly what is going to happen at every stage of the game. You don’t want to deliver a door to a customer who was expecting a half-door. Sometimes, the extra time you take to go over the order will pay dividends when the time to deliver is at hand. Under promise and over deliver.

Third, when you are starting out it is easy to promise the moon, the stars, and everything else in between. That is not a good idea. Your work is your very unique contribution to society and should be valued highly. Each minute you devote to complete a job for a customer is a minute that you won’t have for your family or for something else you would rather be doing. Treat it as a great treasure that you are making available to someone else to enjoy, so don’t give it away.

Overextending your reach!

Next, When you are starting out, you will be overjoyed to receive many orders, and have customers wanting to do business with you. The problem is when you start getting into delivery conflicts where you aren’t able to meet your deadlines and then your ability to stay in business gets impacted. This could be from lack of resources – not enough cash to pay for inventories, not enough cash to meet payroll, and so on, or it could be simply from burnout from working such long hard hours to meet those deadlines while working at a full time job and taking care of a family. Having lots of orders is great but not having a contingency plan can lead to disaster.

Another area that is a problem is dealing with vendors that are also working on building their reputation. When you started working with them you were an unknown and they treated you carefully, then as things improved on your end they started overextending their promises hoping to keep you coming back. Then, the realities of the business start impacting their bottom line and the vendor starts pushing back on promises made earlier on. At this point you could be placed on a hard place where you have no choice but to use the vendor in spite of the broken promises. So, diversify and even work with more than one vendor for the same product. It’s not lack of loyalty but business reality. Your customers expect you to meet the commitments you made to them, every thing else is an excuse.

Working for yourself is a challenge for sure, but you can make it a fun time too.

I’ll revisit this next time with my take on helping you reach out and touch someone to make working for yourself even more interesting.

Until the next time,

Good luck with your business venture.

Home affordability, is it possible?

Retirements down the drain, housing prices at rock bottom, gas prices still too high!

With headlines such as those, it is a wonder that many individuals and families think twice about being able to afford a home. This may be just the right time to change your mind.

For many young couples, the idea of owning their own home or one just like their parents is an attractive idea, but do not think it very realistic. A recent poll conducted by the Associated Press and America On Line Real Estate showed that 80 percent of respondents believed that it is hard for first-time buyers to afford a home. A majority of those polled – 59 percent – also said that they believe it is harder to buy a home now than it was five years ago.

Taking a closer look at the poll reveals that young adults and those that classify themselves as minorities consider the affordability of homes a bigger problem now than five years ago, compared to those over the age of 50 and those that identify themselves as white.

Broken down by region, almost 70 percent of those living in the western United States and almost 65 percent of those living in the Northeastern US say that it’s harder to buy now than five years ago, compared to only 54 percent of those living in the South and 51 percent of those living in the Midwest.

The poll also found that almost half of those surveyed thought that the real estate market in their home area was overpriced.

A recent report by the census bureau seems to back up the findings of the AP/AOL survey. The census report found that approximately one third of all homeowners in the US that have mortgages spent at least 30 percent of their income on housing and housing related costs. It’s widely considered excessive if your housing costs make up more than one third of your income. The census took things like mortgage payments, insurance and utilities and taxes into account.

The biggest reason for this lack of faith in new home ownership can be directly attributed to the recent housing boom over the last five years. Also, a recent increase in mortgage rates has also dampened optimism. And while incomes are up, as well, most don’t even keep up with inflation.

Another recent trend that has kept optimism for first time home buyers down is the 32 percent jump in median home value from 2000 to the end of 2005. The current median price is around $167,500.

Whatever you may be thinking, the time is right for you to buy a home. The home prices are coming down and if you don’t find the right kind of home, or the palace you want, don’t give up altogether and instead consider buying something that you can spring from later on. Mortgage rates aren’t all that high either which is another misconception. With interest rates hovering around 6% your would be crazy to think that that is a bad option. Don’t listen to the doomsayers instead invest in your first home.

If you are looking to start a business, owning your home gives you a lot of perks that you wouldn’t have as a renter and when all is said and done, the tax rebates you will benefit from will be almost the same as having another deduction on your tax return.

Don’t look back. Go ahead and research the area and find a good real estate agent and mortgage banker and take the plunge. It is well worth it.

Share your thoughts on this and let us know what you think.

If you are still unsure of what your next option is, try renting to own.

Wishing you all the very best.