Online Businesses
How to Get Started and Make Money with an Online Business
While the online business space is dominated by major players such as Amazon and eBay, solo Internet entrepreneurs still have many opportunities to create a profitable online business.
Whatever your niche, whatever your product or sector, there is a place for you in the market. And with so many proven tools, services and strategies available to online entrepreneurs, it has never been easier to start an online business and realize substantial profits.
The opportunity - and the profit potential - is only improving in the online market. Several factors are at play here, thanks to some very positive online business trends.
More people than ever are shopping online. According to industry observer Mintel, 69% of Americans do it regularly.
Available software and online tools allow anyone to create and manage an e-commerce website. And you can do it for less than $ 100.
Online marketing is simple and inexpensive - again, anyone can do it. And with social media platforms like Facebook, there are more and more ways to reach your customers.
But how do you start? How are you from your current level to an important passive income that allows you to quit your job and enjoy the ultimate time and financial freedom?
As in life, you start from the beginning. Here are the steps to create your online business, proven methods used by thousands of successful entrepreneurs.
Pick a Profitable Market
This is where you have to put aside your own ego for a minute.
You may have a "dream business" in mind for years. You simply know in your heart that a certain niche is profitable or that a given product will sell like a gangbuster. But until you do the market research, you will not really know it. And it's not worth it to invest your starting capital - time and money - until you're sure about the interest of a particular market.
Basically, you have to start with the market. You need to identify which niches are popular at the moment and which types of products are hot. But be careful not to pick something that is lightning in the pan. (Do you remember those wheeled "hoverboards" that made a splash a few years ago?
Where are they now?) Instead, you want something with the power to stay. These stable markets include:
- Caring for an animal
- Exercise programs and weight loss
- Nutritional Supplements and Natural Remedies
- Trip
- Photography
- Video games
To identify a popular market, check out online retailers such as Amazon.com. Which are the best sellers? Also keep an eye on the news: pick up magazines and see what is advertised or written. And see what people are talking about (or what is being advertised) on Facebook. All these elements make it possible to find a potentially profitable market.
It may seem paradoxical, but you want to see a lot of competition in your market. It's better, at least for a small entrepreneur like you, not to be a pioneer first on the market. You want to go where there is already a large group of people willing to buy.
What's left is to match one of these profitable and proven niche markets with something that interests you. With so many potential markets, you're sure to find a way to match your passion to your profits.
The Easiest Way to Start an Online Business: Affiliate Marketing
Once you have selected your very promising market with profit potential, it's time to know what to sell. Fortunately, you do not need to develop, produce or even get your own products! There is a simple way to take advantage of existing products that have a proven track record of profitability. This is called affiliate marketing.
With affiliate marketing, there is evidence that products are selling and you will not have to worry about delivery, storage, order management, customer service, refunds or any other traditional aspect of the sale by retail.
In an affiliate marketing business, you are marketing and promoting products through your ecommerce site, but the online copywriter (or the company that created the product) does the rest. And, as an affiliate, you receive a commission (5% and more, depending on the product) every time someone buys. It's a great way to get started with your business.
Amazon has a good affiliate program, with a wide variety of products.
Clickbank.com specializes in information products, although they also have physical products. You will also find reputable resellers on CJ Affiliate of Conversant (formerly Commission Junction). But just about every niche and every industry has an affiliate program. Research online if it does not suit your market or business.
Other Sources of Profitable Products
Affiliate marketing is the perfect way to immerse your foot in an online business. And this could be your only source of products - this model has the potential to be very profitable and can be expanded easily.
But there are other sources of products on the market and you do not have to make large financial investments to use them.
Direct delivery is very similar to affiliate marketing. In this model, you also sell products from other companies. You market the products on your website. But this time, you process the orders. When they arrive, you send them to your direct shipping partner, who is usually a manufacturer or wholesaler. You pay them, then they send the product directly to your customer.
You earn money on the cost of what you pay to the direct shipper and what you change your customers.
With white label products, you partner with another company with a well-established product. You simply put your name and your mark on it. Often, this online business model is combined with direct delivery. Supplements, cures and other health-related products are a popular niche for white labeling.
Of course, if you are ready to create your own products, you can also do it. But creating a physical product requires a large initial investment with no guaranteed return.
A less risky way to sell your own products would be to create informational products, including e-books, affiliate websites, videos, and audio programs. For example, if you are in the organic gardening niche, you could have a special report on growing organic watermelons in an ebook or video featuring the best pest control techniques without pesticides.
If it's electronic, it can be easily stored in the cloud or on your hard drive and delivered over the Internet. This makes it extremely inexpensive and requires little effort. The only thing you spend on developing these products is your time and expertise.
Set Up Your Website So You Have Total Control
You have your market and your product. Now is the time to set up your online storefront, where you will market and sell your products.
You do not have to be a tech genius to create your own website for your online business, and you also do not need to hire a costly website designer. With the software and online programs and services available today, anyone can create a professional-quality website that includes a shopping cart, list features, blogs, and everything you need to your flourishing online business.
And the best is that it's free, or at least very inexpensive. Programs such as WordPress or Squarespace offer ready-to-use templates. Creating your site is as easy
as filling out boxes with your sales pages and registration boxes via e-mail, populating your products in your cart and creating relevant content. If you can send an email, you can set up a website. In addition, you can update and change the look and feel of your site without the need for Web development experience.
These are robust platforms, with many applications and plug-ins for search engine optimization, marketing efforts, analytics to track visitors to your site and much more. When it comes to web hosting and domain name selection, you can often manage it through the same service that is used to create the website or use a specialized service such as GoDaddy. It's yours.
Of course, you can use a professional to create your website, but this approach has significant disadvantages. They are expensive, for one. They often take a lot of time, especially if you hire one with a backlog of clients. You must contact them (and pay them) whenever you want to make changes. And they charge on time, which is not good when you have a startup budget.
But with the providers I mentioned, you do not have to worry about that. You'll be in charge of your website and will be able to make changes 24 hours a day, 7 days a week - giving you total control of your online business.
Create a List and Promote Products with Email Marketing
When you have a business, you need customers to survive. It's obvious. But how to find prospects - people interested in your product - and turn them into buyers?
For a start-up, a small online business, it is better to search for your target market, ask for their email, and then market it on this list. You can create your mailing list in different ways. Once you have your subscriber list, you have to start marketing them. But it's not about sending sales offers day after day. People will soon unsubscribe or even report you as spam.
It is also important to convey valuable information to your prospects. Give them a lot of gifts - tips and tricks in your niche. It makes them know, love and trust you. For example, you can "warm up" them with valuable content in a newsletter. You can also do this in your blog, e-books, special reports, Facebook posts, videos and audios.
Of course, even if you are a good person, you are not just in humanity. You want to make money with your online business. You must also combine sales offers with your content.
It pays to have finesse here. You cannot simply send them an order form: you must show them the benefits of the product. You have to paint an image (figuratively) that shows them how their life will be better if they use your product. You must prove that it works. Finally, you must encourage them to buy the product - a special offer that they cannot refuse. People are naturally reluctant to buy something new, so you need to create excitement and desire for your product.
You do this with an effective sales copy. It's the art of using words to tap into consumer psychology. And you need to use these principles in just about every communication with customers, whether on your website, in your email, in your social media posts, or in your paid ads.
If you are considering writing your own copy, it is important to study writing and marketing techniques, focusing on direct response marketing. And there's a ton of free information from groups like American Writers and Artists Inc. and Copyblogger.com. You can also hire editors at sites such as Upwork.
4 Ways to Drive Traffic to Your Online Business
The cheapest - but time-consuming - way to drive traffic to your online business is to slowly but surely add valuable content (written or video) on your niche to your website and / or blog. This will attract the attention of search engines such as Google. These search engine optimization (SEO) efforts will pay off by increasing the traffic to your website by people searching for information about your subject. A percentage of these people will also subscribe to your mailing list. That's why it's best to have a registration box, usually asking for a first name and an email address, prominently on your homepage.
But for this to work, you must be consistent. You must add fresh and relevant content several times a week, if not daily. Suppose your business is focused on yoga. You can write about trends, watch yoga DVDs, and comment on new yoga-related stories and yoga styles. Start a conversation with your prospects and offer valuable information and information, and do it in a way that will attract potential customers to find information on the subject.
Social media is another inexpensive way to drive traffic to your website and create your list. With Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms, you can create a free account and publish content related to your business. As with blogs or web content, you need to combine useful and actionable content, as well as direct invitations to visit your site and subscribe to the list (or even buy products).
Again, post regularly and be consistent with your messages.
YouTube is one of the main drivers of traffic. In many ways, it's one of the world's top search engines: if people have a question about a topic, they often go to YouTube to find the answer. To take advantage, you can publish explanatory videos, spoken videos where you explain a topic related to your niche and explanatory videos. Simply provide useful content - and a link to your website.
Of course, there are also paid advertising methods for generating traffic, including banners, inserted ads, pay-per-click ads, and so on. But it can be expensive. I therefore recommend focusing on ways to generate free traffic at the beginning. Get your website exactly the way you want, fine-tune your product line, fine-tune all of your online activities, and start making sales. Then, once you have a little income, you can recover in your business, you can explore the paid ads.
Putting It All Together
This has been an intensive course to start your own online business from scratch. This may seem like a daunting process. It is not obligated.
But it will take time and effort, and you will have to make difficult choices along the way. The trick is to do a little each day and go in the right order: Find your market, then your product, then create your site and start marketing. Do this and you will build a solid foundation for a business that will last and generate revenue for years to come.
