Starting an Online Business

The Guide to
Starting an
Online Business

Introduction
2 | The Guide to Starting an Online Business
It takes an intelligent plan to start an online business. While starting an online business is the entrepreneurial dream
for many in the 21st
century, it’s easier said than done. The stats say that approximately 80% of all online businesses
are doomed to failure [1]. With failure rates so high, even on the web, what can be done to raise your chances of
starting a successful, online business?
More than you think, actually. For starters, don’t let the high failure rates demoralize you. You can overcome these bad
stats by coming up with a sound business plan that’s based on an in-depth understanding of the market or industry in
which you plan to operate. This takes copious research, but look at it this way: The more you know about your market and
its needs, the more you’re going to be able to provide a highly valuable product or
service to solve your customers’ problem.
And that’s precisely where the nuts and bolts of starting a successful online
business lie. To start an online business is something that anyone can do;
the key is turning your startup into something successful that solves your
target audience’s problem and delights them. You can’t do this without a
sound business plan.

This is the foundation of your entire online business:
its business plan. Any soli ive summary [2]:
• The business concept – A description of your online
store, its product or service, and the market it’ll serve
• Its financial features – Things like projected sales,
profits, cash flows and ROI (return on investment)
• Its financial requirements – A statement of how much
capital your online store needs to start up and then
expand
• The current business position – Relevant company
information such as its legal type of operation,
inception date, principal owners and key people
• Its major achievements – Developments inside your

online business that are crucial to its success; things like
patents, prototypes, facility locations, necessary
contracts and even test-marketing results
• While all five elements are vital, be sure to put extra time
into your business concept. Here’s where you define what
your online business is about, what customer problem
its product or service will solve, and how your unique
value proposition (why you’re better than any other
business in your space) will solve the customer’s problem.
• Be succinct and straight-to-the-point when composing
this section because you want to quickly communicate
the crucial details to your readers (read: investors) so
they’ll read on - not waste their time.
1. Write an Effective
Business Plan

2. Create a Website
Ecommerce accounts for a lot of retail sales today. Since your
online business will be web-exclusive, it really pays to have a
professional designer/developer build it for you. You don’t need
to spend an arm and a leg for it; just keep it simple and basic. It
should be a website that’s extremely user-friendly, so that your
shoppers can easily find the product or service they want and
then check out on your site without any friction whatsoever.
Make up and choose an easy and memorable domain name for
your online business. To start an online business, you need a URL,
which you can buy for a reasonable price at many websites all
over the web. [3] You’ll also require a good web host to keep your
online store up and running 24/7/365. As with your URL, you can
find a myriad of web hosts all over the Internet, some of whom are
better than others. [4] To settle on a web host with which you feel
comfortable, you may want to read web-host reviews from sites
like Who Is Hosting This?, which provide a comparison of different
web hosts. [5]

3. Work on Your Site’s SEO
SEO is short for search engine optimization, and it’s the most powerful
tool on the web for enabling your target audience to find your online
business! Begin with keyword research, which is the basis of any powerful
SEO campaign: Choosing the right keywords for your online business will
ensure that the appropriate kinds of customers find your online store
when putting in your keywords on the web. [6]
After you know your keywords, you should move to optimize your entire
site. Best practices of SEO include optimizing the URLs of each page,
creating a site map for spiders to crawl your pages and get them indexed
on search engines, starting a blog on your site and regularly publishing
keyword-suitable articles, and using PPC (pay-per-click). [7]
In addition, you should also work on building up a strong network of
high-quality backlinks to your site. [8] Backlinks are the backbone to any
successful SEO campaign because they help to determine your site’s SEO
ranking based on the quality of links pointing back to your site. In addition,
they also point web traffic back to your site, thereby increasing the number
of site visitors your online store gets, which brings with it more leads as well.

4. Use Social Media to
Drive Leads to Your Website
Social media is not just for posting pictures of
what delicious food you had at that restaurant
last weekend. It’s a hardcore marketing tool for
serious businesses! When you’re starting an
online business, you want to push your brand in
front of as many people as possible, and social
media will help you do just that.
You can curate your different social media streams
- Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram - to
constantly present relevant, industry-specific
content about your space to your leads, customers
and peers. When doing so, it’s imperative that just
20% of your content is self-promoting; otherwise,
it’ll just turn off potential leads on social media. [9]
For example, let’s say your new business sells IT
software. In that case, you’d take to Twitter to share
the most informative and helpful industry news/
infographic/videos about IT software that you can
find on the web. By doing this consistently, people
will see your brand as someone credible and be
more motivated to click the backlink from your
social media profile to your website!
The same thing works if you, in another example,
sell delicious cakes only online. By using Pinterest
and Instagram to post pictures of sumptuous
confections in general - including a few promotional
shots of your own cakes - you can drive traffic to
your site efficiently.

As soon as you get some customers and regular site
visitors, don’t hesitate to build an opt-in list for emails.
Chances are that people who regularly visit your site will
be very open to voluntarily signing up for email updates
from your brand, just because they already enjoy your
product or service. Another option would be to require
subscription that’d involve them giving you their email
addresses in exchange for premium content (ebooks,
white papers, etc.).
In either case, having an opt-in email list is the way to
market your brand because these are people who have a
desire for your content [10]. In short, that makes them the
perfect recipients for promotional materials like when you
have a new sale going on or when you have a special, one-
time deal happening at your online store.
Of course, before you have site visitors who actually
want to join such an opt-in list or subscribe for additional
content, you have to have high-quality content on your
site in the first place that would persuade them to want to
stick around. For instance, you can curate a blog that you
regularly update with stellar advice, information, tips and
news relevant to your industry and geared toward solving
a problem for your readers. Such content would make you
look like you understand your customers’ needs, which
increases chances of them opting in.
5. Take Advantage
of Email Marketing

There’s nothing like positioning yourself as an expert
in your field when you start an online business. This
immediately boosts your credibility and thusly persuades
leads to do business with you. If you do this right, you
actually create a system of qualified leads that come to
your site because they already made up their minds that
your product or service is what they need. How do you do
this?
By guest blogging like crazy on highly trafficked authority
sites in your industry. See, guest blogging is a proven,
highly strategic method of bringing new business right to
your doorstep (or website). [11]
Think of it this way: When you’re reading your favorite,
industry-leading publication in whatever niche, you
associate its authors with expertise, simply because they
have bylines on the site and are writing for these highly
regarded publications. Similarly, when you guest-blog
on a site like HubSpot - let’s say you’re a marketer, and
your online business is a marketing consultancy - you
immediately shoot up to expert status because HubSpot is
highly regarded in the inbound-marketing field.
This system of establishing yourself as an expert and
therefore driving leads to your website in the form of
backlinks in your author bio works for every niche, no
matter what.
6. Turn Yourself into an Expert

7. Don’t Forget Back-End
Sales as Well as Upselling
You can make extra income via back-end sales and
upselling. It’s recommended that you pursue every
customer’s so-called lifetime value, especially since
stats say that approximately one-third of all customers
who’ve already bought from you will buy from you again
when you follow up with them. Do you realize what this
means? You already have people ready and willing to buy
from you - all you have to do is reach out to them again
to put them back into your sales or conversion funnel!
That’s super-easy.
Back-end and upselling tactics like these are great
follow-up approaches:
• Suggest to them a product or service that
complements their initial purchase
• Give them electronic loyalty coupons they’re
able to redeem the next time they visit your site
• Suggest to them a related product or service
on your site’s “thank you” page after they’ve
completed their initial purchase
Sometimes, all that it takes to make people purchase from
your site again is a small, simple and friendly reminder
through a follow up. That’s it! This is really one of the
easiest ways you can secure additional income for your
online business.

8. Follow the Law... All Laws
Doing business on the Internet when you start an online business can be
tricky because you don’t have any physical borders that apply to your
operation. Nonetheless, you still have to abide by the laws of your city,
county and state, not to mention any federal requirements, too [12]. Just
because you’re on the web doesn’t mean that the law isn’t something
you have to contend with. For instance, let’s say that your online store
operates in a state that charges customers a sales tax. In this case, you’re
obligated to apply for a tax permit or, in some cases, simply register with
the state revenue bureau.
Think that’s all - if only! Since ecommerce means that your customers
will come to you from all over the globe, you’ll also have to contend with
international trade laws, as pesky and cumbersome as that sounds. We
recommend researching, understanding and following all international trade
laws to guarantee that you’re in compliance with any and all regulations.
The last thing you want is for your online store to be shut down, fined or
penalized in some other way, when you’ve already put so much careful and
determined effort into starting an online business.

Conclusion
An online store is a time-consuming,
significant endeavor that you
can’t underestimate. You’ll likely
be working more than 40 hours
a week when you first start an
online business. This speaks to the
dedication that you’ll have to show
to make this a success. Dedication
only goes so far, though, which is
why you’ll have to rely on a sound
plan to have any hope of turning your
online store into a profitable and
sustainable business.
You start an online business by first
writing a solid business plan that’s not
overly optimistic, but takes a realistic
view of your situation. From there, you
have to get your web presence up and
running because your online store is
the way your customers will buy your
product or service. That’s why it has to
be easy to use and very user-friendly.
Now, you just need people to find your
business on the Internet, which is why
marketing is so vital, whether that’s
through SEO, social media or email
campaigns.
Even if you have a solid business plan
in place and have the marketing under
control, you still can’t forget about any
applicable business regulations.
Being an entrepreneur is the dream of
many people. When you run an online
business effectively, you get to enjoy
independence and the perks of being
your own boss. Before you get to that
point, you have to execute all aspects
of starting an online business well.

References
http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/75484-8-Reasons-Why-Ecommerce-Businesses-Fail
http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/38308
https://www.google.com/search?sclient=psy-ab&biw=2560&bih=1239&q=gyrator+definition&oq=gyrator+d&gs_
l=&pbx=1&pf=p&sugexp=ernk_zc&gs_rn=64&gs_ri=psy-ab&pq=rise%20of%20hamburger%20menu&cp=9&gs_id
=13&xhr=t&cad=cbv&sei=R43DVajfJ4HVoASPgoLQAw#q=buy+a+url
https://www.google.com/search?sclient=psy-ab&biw=2560&bih=1239&q=gyrator+definition&oq=gyrator+d&gs_
l=&pbx=1&pf=p&sugexp=ernk_zc&gs_rn=64&gs_ri=psy-ab&pq=rise%20of%20hamburger%20menu&cp=9&gs_id
=13&xhr=t&cad=cbv&sei=R43DVajfJ4HVoASPgoLQAw#q=best+web+host
http://www.whoishostingthis.com/hosting-reviews/
https://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo/keyword-research
http://searchengineland.com/21-essential-seo-tips-techniques-11580
[1]
[2]
[3]
[4]
[5]
[6]
[7]

References
http://www.webconfs.com/importance-of-backlinks-article-5.php
http://www.socialmediatoday.com/content/8020-rule-why-just-20-your-
social-media-content-should-be-about-your-brand
http://blog.hubspot.com/insiders/how-to-build-an-opt-in-email-list
http://feldmancreative.com/2015/01/benefits-of-guest-blogging/
https://www.sba.gov/content/start-online-business
[8]
[9]
[10]
[11]
[12]
All images are subject to copyright.

Starting an Online Business

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