Biz Buzz
Why an Internet Business?
Why start an internet business instead of a traditional business? That may have been a valid question ten maybe fifteen years ago, but I believe the question today has become why would anyone start anything BUT an internet business? Read on to learn more about the many advantages of online business over traditional brick and mortar business models.
Probably the most basic advantage an online business has over traditional is the lack of barriers to entry. Startups need capital just to get up and running but they also need capital to buy them time to gain a presence in the market and get their name known. With the advent of the Internet and subsequent online businesses we are now so far beyond what they used to call "hanging out your shingle".
The biggest problem that most people face when trying to figure out where to start is information overload. There is so much and often it is conflicting or confusing at best, and at worst can even be misleading. The endless barrage of "join this" or "buy that" become overwhelming and they simply give up or, maybe even worse, step onto a never ending treadmill of preparation.
I learned a lot of things simply by making mistakes or by trial and error in my efforts to discover what works and what doesn't. I've created this site to provide realistic, time tested tips and resources for both start ups and established businesses who are looking to establish or improve their online presence.
If you have specific questions or issues that you can't find an answer for, submit your questions via the comments form below. I will write full responses to the best questions in a new post. You'll get an email if your question is chosen with a link to that post.
Whether you are looking to find resources to start your first Internet business or just looking to find the latest tips, tools and tactics being used bookmark this site, sign up to receive our Blog updates and you will always have the latest news from the leading edge of internet marketing, straight up, to the point and always based on direct first hand experience.
Sticks and Bricks Business Model
The original business model was founded on finding the best location, or at least the best location you could afford, setting up shop and hanging out a sign, or your shingle, then waiting for Joe and Jane public to start coming by. The hope was that Joe or Jane would find your wares attractive and buy, over time your store would gain a reputation and others would come too. This worked quite well so long as there was no competition and stood to keep the local merchant in a fine position within the community making a nice living thank you very much.
The downside was that the store needed to be manned and kept in good condition so overheads ate up a large percentage of profits. Merchants would find themselves raising prices to keep up with rising rents, cost of goods and payroll just to keep the doors open and the lights on. So the vicious circle continued and many business owners find themselves running like a hamster on a wheel and getting understandably nowhere.
The Internet Business Model
An internet business model lowers the barriers to entry in several very important ways, not least of which is cost of initial start up. You can have an internet presence within days if not hours if you take advantage of the latest, highly affordable technology and software that is available to help you get started quickly and the right way. It costs less than $10 to register a domain and you can get your site hosted for less than $75 for a year. Using a website design template and customizing it as your starting point does not mean that you need to give up on having a professional looking site, although it will help you get started much faster and at much lower cost.
You can avoid the cost of warehousing and carrying inventory by finding Drop Ship suppliers of quality products in your niche who will handle the pick, pack & ship elements of the business. If you produce or manufacture your product you can choose to do so yourself or you can outsource those tasks to a fulfillment house. Yes this will mean you have to cover the cost of their services, but a good fulfillment house will provide many services depending on your specific needs. They can not only manufacture, package, store and ship your product, many also offer customer service assistance and they provide excellent monitoring of inventory and sales.
If you choose to sell digital products even better, you can delivery those by immediate download and offer CD by mail backup as an upsell. Again you can have a fulfillment house handle the production and shipping of backup CD's.
Monitoring and measuring the growth of any business is essential to understanding which products generate profits and where there is room for improvement. Online businesses have an incredible advantage over traditional models here, because sales are made online almost all aspects of the business can be closely tracked. You can track exactly where your customers are coming from, how they find and how long they stay on your site, which pages they visit and how long they stay on site, you can even see which pages they visit before they buy. All of this tracking can be done for FREE using basic tools provided by the search engines and freely available online. There is no excuse for any website not having traffic analytics and by far the most popular and comprehensive analytics program Google analytics is absolutely free, so there's absolutely no excuse for not having this kind of tracking on your site.
Once you have your supply chain and website in place it is time to start letting people know you are open for business. Again there are many low cost or even free tools to help you get the word out and start driving traffic to your site. You can even "buy" traffic for your site by investing in Paid Search advertising, but you can also generate buzz about your site by issuing press releases, blogging and through the strategic use of social media such as FaceBook and Twitter.
Buy or Build?
Some people enjoy the process and challenges of starting a business form scratch, others prefer to step into a business that already has some history behind it and look to grow it from there. You can experience great success either way, the most important thing is to have clear goals and objective that are both manageable and measurable. Start with a clearly defined plan, manageable interim objectives, then work the plan and measure your results.
Buying a Business
Check out the tips on the Biz Buying Tips sub page of this post for more tips and a cheat sheet you can use to help you identify the right business to buy and even how to grow it once you become the new owner. You should never buy a business without a clear picture of where you want to take it and how you can get it there.
Selling a Business
At some point you may decide to sell your online business, and there are plenty of buyers out there looking for a good business opportunity to buy simply so they don't have to re-invent the wheel. They prefer to find something that has a proven, sustainable history behind it and build from there.
Check out the Biz Selling Tips sub page to find tips and advice on how to best position your business for sale and to maximize the sales price you are able to achieve.
If you follow the tips on this site when developing your business, regardless if you buy or build, you will be well positioned to maximize revenue and profits while you own it and get top dollar if and when you ever come to sell it.
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