Learn how to start an online business from scratch. Includes guides, tools, and tutorials for starting an online business.
How to Start An Online Business: Starting an online business isn’t that hard. You just need to know what you’re doing, and it’s best to start with some simple steps. Follow these 7 simple steps to get your online business off the ground and moving in the right direction, no matter what kind of business you’re starting.
How to Start An Online Business
The first step is getting your online business off of the ground. Choose a business that you are passionate about and one that can be done from home. Next, find a reputable and easy-to-use shopping cart software, such as osCommerce or WordPress eCommerce Plugins.
To properly handle your inventory, accounting, and shipping for an online store will require dedicated computer hardware (such as Ubuntu Linux) as well as software like Webmin or cPanel for web hosting account management. Finally, build a website for your new business with free tools like WordPress. org. Use Google Adwords to help get traffic to your site, which will lead to sales!
Step 1 – Choose Your Niche
Choosing your niche is one of, if not THE most important step in starting an online business. One of your primary goals will be getting as much free organic traffic as possible, and choosing a niche that has low competition will make it easier for you to achieve that goal. Another reason choosing a niche is important is so you can do proper research on it and build authority in it (and thus make money off it).
The point here is that without having chosen your niche yet, there’s no point in continuing with these steps. Read more about how to choose your niche here. Get all our tips on how to start an online business here. Step 2 – Create a website: Once you’ve chosen your niche, it’s time to create a website around it. Building a website is easy, even if you have little or no experience doing so.
There are plenty of tools out there like WordPress which allow you to create professional-looking websites with minimal effort and skill required. You don’t need any technical skills or knowledge to create a good-looking site either – just follow some simple instructions and have fun creating! Check out our guide on how to start an online business from scratch here.
Step 2 – Do your research
Are you an expert in your business field? Do some research. Are you starting a business that is similar to others out there? What makes your business different? Why should customers buy from you instead of your competitors? Answer these questions and more through thorough research, customer surveys, online forums, professional associations, going door-to-door, or even just sitting at local businesses and asking customers how they feel about their product or service.
Do as much research as possible so that when you’re ready to launch, you know exactly what kind of business model will work best for you. If you don’t have enough information to answer all of these questions yourself, seek help from people who do. If you can afford it, hire consultants or advisors who are experts in your industry and ask them for advice on which direction to take. Remember: You’re not looking for someone to give you answers; rather, look for someone who can help guide you toward finding those answers yourself.
Step 3 – Build Your Website
There are two options when it comes to building your website. Either you can hire someone or create one yourself. If you’re on a tight budget, there are plenty of free and/or low-cost website-building tools out there that don’t require coding knowledge (just make sure they are mobile-friendly). Many startups end up creating their own sites because they want total control over design and functionality—and they don’t want to spend extra money in the early days.
But if you choose to go with an off-the-shelf solution, just be sure that your site is easy for customers to navigate and load quickly. And remember: The most important part of any business is getting customers. So even if your site looks great, if people can’t find it or get frustrated trying to use it, then all of those hours spent designing were wasted.
Step 4 – Create Online Content
Creating online content is arguably one of your most important tasks as an entrepreneur. And because of that, it’s also going to be one of your most time-consuming and difficult jobs. Most entrepreneurs don’t set out with blogging in mind—and many don’t stick with it. However, creating good-quality original content on a regular basis will help grow your audience.
If you have time for nothing else, spend enough time on creating great content for your website and social channels so that you can get some momentum going early on in your business! The more people who find you, like what they see, and engage with your content, the better chance you have at building up a community around your brand. So start blogging today.
No excuses! It’s easier than ever before. All you need is WordPress and Google apps installed on your computer and you’re ready to go! Sign up for Mailchimp or another email service provider (more details below) to make sure people can subscribe via email too.
Step 5 – Build up your email list
Once you’ve worked out what your subscribers want, use online tools like SurveyMonkey or Vovici (which is made by ProBlogger’s founder) to build up your email list and collect their email addresses. You should make it as easy as possible for people to sign up for your newsletter. For example, if someone makes a comment on one of your posts, add them straight into an auto-responder sequence. This way, they don’t have to enter their details again in order to sign up.
If you are selling products from your website, include an option at the checkout that allows customers to opt into your mailing list so that they can be notified when new products become available. It will also help with remarketing down the line.
It’s also worth building relationships with influencers in your niche—they’re usually more than happy to swap guest posting opportunities for product mentions and vice versa. Aim to get around 10% of your target audience on board before launching your full business idea, which will give you plenty of leads to follow up with over time. Just remember not to spam them! The last thing you want is negative feedback scaring off all those hard-earned subscribers.
Step 6 – Get traffic to your site
After you have your business plan in place, it’s time to start getting traffic. Getting traffic is critical to building your business. It’s important not only that you get a lot of traffic but also that you get highly targeted and relevant traffic. Fortunately, there are many ways you can do so: SEO, social media, PPC advertising—it’s all going to depend on your specific business model and on how much cash flow you have available.
If you don’t want to spend any money initially (as was my situation), then focus on SEO and driving relevant organic traffic by creating content that gets people sharing and linking back to your site. You’ll need to build links from other sites as well. Don’t forget about social media! In fact, if you’re just starting out I’d say that’s where most of your attention should be focused.
Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter will provide you with an almost unlimited supply of potential customers for free – provided you know what you’re doing. Once again, it’s going to take some trial and error but once you’ve got a handle on things your online business will really take off!
Step 7 – Profit!
If you follow these steps, there’s no reason why your online business can’t be profitable. Remember though that there is no magical step 7 – it’s hard work and determination that will get you there. Be passionate about what you do and provide customers with valuable content or products and they’ll be sure to keep coming back for more. If you have any questions on how to start an online business then please don’t hesitate to ask – we’re happy to help!
All you need to do now is turn your posts into unique pieces of content and promote them on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. It doesn’t matter whether you’re creating a single piece of unique content or multiple pieces; however, quality always trumps quantity. Always aim to give as much value as possible to each piece of content so that people will naturally want to share it (which brings us to our next point).
In terms of promotion methods, there are many ways in which you can promote your new posts (or even existing posts) using social media.
Also Read: How to Start Your Own Business
Conclusion
Before you get started, there are just two things you need to do: (1) Determine your primary goal for creating an online business. Do you want more time? More money? More freedom? Figuring out why you’re getting into an online business is going to be crucial as you go through all of these steps.
