Five tips to know before starting an online business.

People start online or internet business for many reasons.

• They want to work from home.
• They want to be entrepreneurs.
• They want to fire their bosses or their bosses have fired them.
• They want to make money online.
• They are looking to add to their existing cash flow.
• They can’t find another job that pays well.

For what ever reason people like us start online home businesses, it has been my experience that by doing a little homework will save you a lot of time and most of all money and avoid the pitfalls that most online entrepreneurs run into.

Don’t get me wrong, I encourage capitalism and the spirit of entrepreneurs all over the world.  But there’s nothing more frustrating, heartbreaking and depressing than putting so much effort into a business and watching it die before it even gets off the ground.

I would like to share my personal experiences of running a few online businesses as well as a small retail business and the five things that I believe people can benefit from.  The experiences have been both good, bad and at time painful and humbling, but thru the pain and frustration comes enlightenment, knowledge and a rekindling of my own faith and confidence in starting a new online venture and moving forward. 

The first thing is your STATE OF MIND.

  Some call it “mindset” or “attitude” but it’s the same thing and it starts here.  You must be absolutely positive and committed to success and not be afraid to fail.  Being industrious, confident, enthusiastic and completely focused on the end result will help you through the very frustrating time of the start up phase. At times you will feel overwhelmed, but know that it’s perfectly normal.  But you need to push through it.  Without a good solid state of mind, your business will surely fail.  It’s just like building the tallest building upon sand.  No matter how big the vision, without a strong base it can’t help but crumble.  My business coach taught me to work on myself twice as hard as I worked on my business.  That’s because the success of the business is a result of what goes on in my head.  Key:  Read great books about great people everyday.

The second thing is RESEARCH.

1. You’ll thank yourself later.   Key:  Use the internet to research businesses.

The next thing is your BUDGET.

1. Key:  Sit down and write down on a piece of paper exactly how much you want to invest.

The fourth thing is DISCIPLINE.

If you are going to be working from home, you really need to learn to block out distractions and master your time management.  Working from home sounds really exciting when you think about it.  No bosses, spouses or kids to bother you are wonderful things, but without self discipline you’ll end up watching TV, taking a nap, going to mall to buy something for the business, then you get side tracked.  Next thing you know, it’s been a few hours and nothing got done.  Make a schedule the night before and follow it no matter what unless there’s an emergency or something.  You can always tell if you displayed discipline and proper time management by asking yourself at the end of each day “did I accomplish everything that I needed to for my business to succeed’?

The final element is PERSISTANCE.

So many of us, including myself have given up when success was right around the corner.  Work hard and with enthusiasm and things will start to happen.  It may take a time and while I can’t tell you exactly how long it may take because every person and every business is different, I can tell you this, winners of races don’t always go to the fastest or strongest, but a lot of time to the person who never gave up and stayed in the race.  Abraham Lincoln failed twice in business, lost eight political elections before becoming president and suffered a nervous breakdown before he was elected president.

There are other traits and element to success but you’ll find they will fall within one of these categories.  I wish you all the best on your journey.  May you find or create the right online business for yourselves.

The internet is a powerful tool; unfortunately many businesses spend money on the internet and have never seen a return from their dollars.

So how can you grow your online business?

First ask yourself three questions:

Am I meeting a need? Or what solution am I offering?

How can people that need me become aware that they do and reach me?

Will my customers be satisfied with my service and become marketing agents for my business?

Now that you have identified what you are offering and your audience, let’s get started on growing your business. Every customer wants to walk away happy with the product they have bought, and we would love for them to as well. Unfortunately, that is not always possible.

This is where after sales service comes in. Always accept any responsibility that is yours and reasonable. Replace or return monies, avoid any open disputes, as this is often not good for business. These will be the few and far between. Now onto our business that is making us money.

How do we keep it coming? Here are four (4) simple tips to help Grow your Online Business:

• Market effectively – position yourself to learn the skills necessary for your business’ sustainability.
• Give value, the customer will appreciate it and return over and over again, you will grow a base of loyal customers that will even buy any other products that you offer.
• Wise spending: overheads, quality and efficiency yet for as reasonable a price from your end and theirs, that is, a lean operation beat your competition on price and quality as much as possible.
• Deliver the goods.

A successful Online Business will have the following:

• A focused market – everyone is not a customer.
• Creates opportunity to duplicate success – that is, your results can be achieved continually.
• A Marketing Platform to continuously deliver the goods.
• Complimentary products and services that will expand your business and customer base.

And remember to always add a personal touch to ensure you develop a bond with your customer.

The first mistake many newbies make and even some experienced marketers, is speaking about their primary business when social networking. We get all excited with our new venture and all we want to do is talk abot our business. If you do that people beg off because you have not branded yourself yet. Also the majority of  the  network marketing companies will not allow discussion about them outside of the corporate web site, and this also allows you to avoid any legalities that may arise.
 
Step two, actually use your product! Become its biggest supporter. Want to be natural when you tell your story as it is much easier if it is true. Fake it to make never works in the long run.  Folks respond more positively  to well spoken personal stories involving the product because you have an emotional tie in based on your experience with its use.

Consistency is another key. Building relationships online is time consuming. Online relationships and business is about people (hence social networking) not brick and mortar. You cannot sit back and hide behind your terminal, which brings me to my next point.

Massive ACTION must be taken daily! Many newbies are under the impression that they can work 3 to 4 hours a day from home to get started. Sorry doesn’t work that way. Focus, motivation, attention to detail, write lists daily, weekly, monthly. This is your business, not your teams or  downlines or whatever. There are so many distractions/variables to working fom home so understand what it is that you really want from the business.
I post mine on a sheet of paper right above my work area so I am reminded daily of why I chose to work from home.

Accountability and responsibility are yours! No one elses.  You could not succeed in a corporate career by starting off a few hours a day. Bust it until you have reached your goal and then celebrate life. Need help to stay on track, make sure that you are part of a strong team or coach or sponsor. You are really only as good as those you surround yourself with.

If you have not set any goals, what are you doing, where are you going, and how are you ever going to get there? Set them, achieve them, celebrate your successes and then set higher goals so on and so forth.  Be detailed, a goal is not wanting to make more money, the goal should be I want to make 10K a month period. Studies have shown time and again that  great leaders who set detailed goals reached them far more often than those that did not.

If your company has meetings, webinars, conferences or you belong to networking groups that do, attend as often as you can. Why? because the difference it makes by engaging with those that have been successful and understanding, that at one point, they were just where you are at today gives you so much more confidence in going forward. Opportunities of one on ones are so rare in the online business world that every one should be embraced as a rare knowledge building campaign.

Do you know who your competitors are, or even how well do you know your product? As I said before you must utilize your product so that you can speak to all of its benefits for your customers. When you are just starting you only need know it well enough to talk about it in generalities but beware that in order to brand yourself as that expert you need to be an expert at some point. This expertise helps you stand out and attracts people to your business or product. Also what types of products are your competition, as you will have questions and concerns from your clients that you will have to be able to address. Once you are comfortable in both it can only help to grow your business.

Each day you should set aside some time for self growth and improvement, training and visualization. What levels do you aspire to, guaranteed someone has been there done that, what can you learn from them? Time is money, right?, you can save valuable time daily by learning techniques from proven masters.
Do you wish to try and fail, try and fail, try and fail or listen to someone who has already had success? Grow yourself, improve yourself, get training when needed and visualize your success.

Probably the hardest to understand, and the most important is that you never quit. Quiters never win and winners never quit. How many times did Edison fail with the light bulb? People quit for many reasons but mainly because things start to look a little discouraging and nothing they try seems to be working and they lose focus and commitment. Now is when you nust think back to what your original motivation was and recommit yourself to your goals, dreams, and the other steps above. Seek guidance if you must but do not stop. 3% succeed, you can too and you won’t be sorry that you stayed the course.

My community will help you stay on track!