How to Start an Online Business

If you are thinking of starting your own online business then to help you we've listed the main areas to focus on for this business opportunity as well as writing an online internet business plan and start up costs.

There are the same disciplines when operating an internet business as with a bricks and mortar business although you won't get as close to customers as with BAM.

Low cost of Entry

The dot com boom and low entry costs make an online business a great entry point but as with all businesses there are no easy ways to make money easily.

So whatever type of business you are thinking of developing such as a blog, downloadable games, retail shopping site, home based business, ebay store, then use these guides for working from home to develop your internet marketing e-commerce site.

Your Online Business Plan

Before you start you'll need a business plan for your venture. This essential document shows yourself and any investor your overall business objectives and financial summaries. No bank will lend without one so you should think about planning at the outset. We recommend using this internet business plan showing you an example of what your completed business plan should look like.

Once you have your business plan ready you'll see just how many people you need to get buying your products each day to reach your profit numbers. To most, this initial projection may be a shock as although the margins can be high (especially on ebooks and digital products) you will have to get thousands of visitors to your website and that's where internet marketing and SEO comes into play - which we look at later.

Getting Started - Domain, Hosting and Website Design

If you know what products you want to sell the first thing you'll need is a domain name a hosting account and a design for your website. The first 2 are easy and very cheap. .co.uk domain names should cost less than £5 per year and the same goes for hosting. Search for reviews for hosting companies to find someone suitable for you.

A web design can make or break your venture. You can do it yourself if you're prepare to learn HTML and some basic php coding (if on linux servers) but you can also get someone to design an e-commerce site for you for £300 or less. Be careful of all the template sites out there. The designs may look nice but will be bloated with code that's not required and you may not own the images.

If you are simply selling an ebook then a simple header and sale letter page are generally all that's required. If you are new to direct selling (as in direct mail techniques) look at the pages from the clickbank best sellers and see how the web copy flows to get an idea of what's required. The same techniques are used on the shopping channels (the 30 minute sales channels with tons of "fake looking" testimonials) where they repeat the offer and sell the benefits over and over again.

If you are new to copywriting then search online for copywriting examples especially with headlines and body copy. Michel Fortin is renowned and has a great blog.

Accepting Online Payments

With any product online you need to be able to take secure payments from your website. The easiest way to get started is to accept payments via PayPal. This was originally set up for ebay sellers but now almost all websites accept paypal and you will find that you will make a lot of sales this way as most people don't think of their paypal balance as "real money".

To accept credit cards yourself you'll need a merchant account which you can obtain from your bank. Then you'll need an intermediary payment gateway that links your website to your bank. Protx is one option and the fees are low or you can use a Worldpay account that does everything for you although the fees and set up costs are very high (but you can get them reduced if you negotiate with them).

Other Website Requirements

It's a legal requirement in the UK to have the company address posted on your website mostly under the contect us page. It's best if you can also have a telephone contact number, a VAT number if applicable and your company number that's easily found. This also adds to the credibility of the website to provide trust to the people who you want to purchase from your site.

Website Vistors - SEO

SEO stands for search engine optimisation and summarises the methods required to get your site ranked on the free listings in the major search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN (or live.com). There are many falsehoods about SEO because at the end of the day no body knows how the search engines rank website but some simply tips should get you higher.

Start off with keyword research (ie: the phrases that people actually type in to search for stuff). The page you are writing about for that word should have it in the TITLE meta tag of the page as well as the heading for the page. Then try to write naturally about that phrase, what it is about and other pertinent fact about it.

When your pages are developed you'll need to link on your own website to the pages using the terms you have targeted and get other websites linking to yours. This can be hard as most people know that on the whole links get websites ranked but not all links are worthy.

Pay Per Click - Adwords

Adwords is used by Google and Yahoo to show adverts on the search engine results pages to the top and bottom of the free search listings. It's a fine art to get your advert high without paying too much for it but generally the advert needs to be enticing for people to click on it and go to a page that solves the question a visitor may have in their mind.

These are called landing pages. It's no use if Ikea advertised about sofas and send the person after they click on the ad to their bedroom page or even their home page. Relevancy is key for both your visitor and for Google to rank the advert high on their SERPS and people running their adsense programme.

Conversion Rates

Many people have lost a lot of money by using adwords on their online businesses because their pages did not covert well. Remember that most people are looking for information first and foremost and if they land on your site and leave you'll most likely never see them again. Depending on your business you should think about capturing their details and using an autoresponder series to deliver email messages over time to build up to that all important sale. Certainly when you have customers you should keep in touch by using this method.

For regular shopping sites the following tips can be useful to improve conversions:

• Have easy to find contact details with an address (not PO Box but a real address) and a real telephone number
• Have the "add to cart" button above the fold (and test other versions such as "buy now" and "add to shopping basket"
• Ensure delivery information is known *before* checkout
• Don't ask your customers to open account if it's not required
• Keep the checkout process simple and limited number of steps

Start up Costs

An online business can be one of the cheapest to start but keep in mind this is a real business and treat it as such. Some of the start up costs are as follows:

• Domain name, web hosting, web design
• Company formation for limited companies
• Purchase of stock
• Advertising for pay per click
• Press releases
• Search engine optimsation costs
• Directory submissions costs

Associated with start up costs can be trying to find reliable suppliers. Try and negotiate credit terms so you are not always paying for your products up front.

Other Online Marketing Methods

With any new business you need to get people to know about your site and here are some other methods apart from getting high in the search engines.

• Join and participate in industry forums -- this is a great way to become an expert in your field and you can promote your business via your forum signature
• Article marketing -- there are many article directories online that have great search engine rankings - if you write an article it will most likely rank high on their site, and with your resource box at the end of the article people will click through to your site
• Press releases -- if you write something real newsworthy it will be picked up by journalists -- telephone any publications online or offline that you want to know about your PR and make sure they get your release before the publication date
• Email marketing -- as mentioned above if you collect email addresses you should be sending out messages (not just sales messages) so people will remember your company

We hope this has given you a taster in starting an online business as it's worth the hard work for the rewards you receive.

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