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Picking
an Online Business Model
Already
decided what you have in store for your
customers? If so, very good.
If not, get to it right now!
The
next thing to do on the list is to
choose the right Internet Business
Model. Now this is crucial to your
Internet Business success. The Internet
Business Model has to be right for the
type of product or service you’re
offering to your customers.
When
choosing the right Internet Business
Model, you will want to take the
following factors into consideration:
-
Profit Margin – the higher the
profit margin, the better.
-
Delivery – can be easily
delivered to your customers via a
specifically defined system.
-
Shipping Cost – as low as
possible or even non-.Marketing
specific.
-
Internet Business Models have
different marketing strategies.
-
Choose the model that has the
best marketing strategy for your
specific products or services.
To date,
there are 19 low-cost, high-profit
Internet Business Models
on the Internet to choose from.
Identify your target market
The
inside secret is to search in search
engines (such as Google and Overture)
with keywords related to your products
or services to find out if many
websites, newsletters and community
groups focus on those interests.
Get a
domain name....(an
absolute must!)
I have
already explained to you what a domain
name is. You also know that your website
address can ALSO be your Internet
Business name.
You
will want to take out another new piece
of paper again to write down ALL the
keywords related to your Internet
Business. You see, you want your domain
name to:
-
be
short and easy to remember (and
catchy, too!),
-
be
relevant to the product or service
you’re selling,
-
include keywords of your product or
service to improve search engine
rankings.
For
example, if you want to sell a product
teaching people how to break-dance, then
you will want to start writing down all
the keywords related to break-dance.
For
starters, write 100 keywords. What next,
you ask? Write some more! Write 200 or
300 if you have to. The more keywords,
the better. That is because this is a
one-off activity. And remember that you
will be using this domain name for a
very long time, if not forever. Now,
don’t even get lazy.
Okay,
I’ll offer you some food for thought.
Are
you parent to any child? If you are not,
then imagine you are one right now. You
and your spouse have a child for the
first time. You and your spouse would
want to give the best name to your
child, right? Of course you both would!
You and your spouse would brainstorm on
giving your child the best name. “How
about John?” “Aw, John is too common a
name!” “Then how about …?” “I think the
name…” and finally, your child has a
name to be addressed by.
When
brainstorming on your child’s name, you
and your spouse consciously or
unconsciously know that giving your
child the best and meaningful name is
VERY important because your child will
be living with that name from cradle to
the grave.
So, on
the same token, why would you not think
the same when brainstorming on a good
domain name? This is your Internet
Business. You need to nurture and grow
it during its infancy stages before it
rewards you. Are you not going to give
it your best attention, too?
I hope
that woke you up. Now, back to the
keyword activity…
With
the help of the list of keywords you
have written down, you will find it easy
to get a domain name that fulfills the 3
guidelines stated above.
In the
same example, you would probably come up
with a domain name like
www.howtobreakdance101.com.
Next,
check whether the domain name has been
registered or not. If the domain name
has been registered by someone else, you
will have to use another domain name.
So, maybe you’ll think of using
www.lordofthefloor.com for a domain
name.
When
brainstorming on a good domain name, be
sure to come up with at least a few
names in case the domain name you wish
to use is already taken. Remember me
telling you that there can never be two
houses bearing the same address?
Another thing you have to consider is
the various kinds of domain names on the
Internet. So you will have to choose
carefully.
Below
are some of the common ones:
.com
- stands for commercial / community.
The most overused domain entity on
the Internet. Recommended for your
Internet Business.
.net
- stands for network.
.org
- stands for organization. A lot of
online communities use this domain
entity.
.gov
- stands for government. All
government web sites use this domain
entity.
.biz
- stands for business. Recommended
for your Internet Business.
The
next thing to do is find a web host. Any
business needs a place to call home. If
you run a conventional business, you
have to rent space in an office or
shopping complex. In the case of setting
up an Internet Business, you need to set
up a virtual space. You do so by
creating a website and finding a host
for your site. A web host company that
makes your site available 24/7 (24 hours
a day, 7 days a week) by maintaining it
on a Web server. I have covered this
topic with you briefly in the second
chapter.
When
sourcing for a good web host, you want
to make sure that your host has a fast
connection to the Internet and can
handle large numbers of simultaneous
visits (also known as hits) that your
website is sure to get eventually. You
also want to make sure that your web
host offers a variety of related
services, including some or all of the
following:
-
E-mail addresses. You’re like to be
able to get several e-mail addresses
for your own. Many web hosts also
give you special e-mail addresses
called autoresponders (discussed
earlier in Chapter 2).
-
Domain name. You and I have just
covered this subject above.
-
Web
page software. Some web hosting
services include web page authoring
/ editing software.
-
Multimedia / CGI scripts. Some web
hosting services have the ability to
serve complex and memory-intensive
content such as RealAudio sound
files or RealVideo video clips. They
also let you process web page forms
that you include on your site by
executing computer programs called
CGI scripts.
-
Shopping Cart software. Most
organizations prove you with Web
page forms that you can fill out to
create sale items and offer them in
an online shopping cart.
-
Site statistics. Site statistics
give you an idea of how many
visitors you have received.
-
Shopping and electronic commerce
features and more.
Make a
simple and professional website.
Since
you’re into business, the purpose of
your website is to SELL. Nothing else!
That’s because YOUR WEBSITE SHOULD HAVE
ONE MAIN FOCUS.
-
No.... it’s not selling dozens
or hundred of products.
-
No.... it’s not links to several
different affiliate programs and
-
No.... certainly not a link to
Yahoo.com.
Doing
any of the above just confuses your
visitors, thus decreasing your chances
of converting them into your customers.
If
you’re selling a product or service, it
should be clear the ONE action you want
them to take. They would either:
But are
you going to let them go away just like
that? Of course, N-E-V-E-R!
So, you
need to get your visitors to leave their
e-mail address and other essential
information for follow-up increases your
chance to help you make a sale because
the fact is that most people don’t buy
on first contact.
To do
this, you write a compelling sales
letter for your product and post it to
your website. You can add images of your
product, testimonials from happy
customers, and other relevant images.
The focus of your website is the sales
letter.
Now,
let’s talk about the layout of your web
page. Your main text color should be
black on a white background. You can
have other colors such as blue, red and
gray on your website, but the background
behind the text should be white. The
color of your main text should be black.
No other exceptions! That is because
this is the easiest format to read. You
are in business so dress your site in a
business manner.
On the
technical side, you can choose from
three methods to create your own web
pages:
·
Do it yourself (D.I.Y.) – if you are
well versed in using web page tools such
as Macromedia Dreamweaver and Microsoft
FrontPage to create your web pages then
this option is probably the best for
you.
· Hire
A Free Lancer, Professional or Internal
I.T. Team - if you don’t know how to
create web pages, you may want to
consider hiring professional help as
learning how to create your own web
pages can be time-consuming. While it
can incur high professional fee, this
option can be your best value for money
in the long run. However, this option
should be filtered out if you’re on a
strict budget.
· Go
to Solobis – if the above two methods
are not for you – don’t sweat over it.
This suite has been set up to remove not
only the technical barriers but also
eliminate risks for aspiring but
clueless Internet Entrepreneurs at an
affordable price. Besides having over
400 beautiful web site templates to
choose from, this suite provides other
Internet Business tools and services
such as Sequential Autoresponders,
Pop-Up Window Generator, Mailing List
Broadcaster, Article Generator, Killer
Sales Letter Generator, Headline
Generator, and many more to get you
starting your Internet Business quickly!
If you are on a strict budget, then all
the more you must go to this suite to
make your dreams of earning income from
the Internet come to life!
Create
a unique selling proposition (USP) for
you product / website.
Find
ways to make your business stand out
from the crowd. Make yourself and your
web site unique in some way and
providing things that others don’t
offer. They can be as tangible as
half-price sales, contests, seasonal
sales, freebies or reports. They can
also make your business site higher in
quality than the rest.
That is
important because there really is no
purpose of your Internet Business to
exist if you have a million visitors
coming to view your site but too few of
them actually become your customers (a
conversion rate of less than 1% is rated
poor).
Here’s
what you can do to create your own USP.
Take a brand new piece of paper and
write, “I know how most…” Then, half-way
down the page, write “Well, what I do
is…”
The
purpose of this activity is to know how
most businesses in your field are in the
first place and then you write what
tells you and your Internet Business
apart from them. This will take a while
to do. Checking on your competition’s
USP is part of the activity, too.
Next,
you will want to write out many phrases
or sentences. This can take days but it
will be worth it for your Internet
Business in the long run. Once you have
just the right phrase, that will be your
USP which you will use to separate you
from all of the competition. Now, that
is what I call UNIQUE!
Write
sales copy that gets results!
Your
website must be treated as a sales
letter, not a brochure. That’s because
brochures don’t sell. Let me repeat –
BROCHURES DON’T SELL.
Brochures just inform theirs viewers of
a product or service. But they won’t
help you make even a sale (unless that
is really what you want but hey, I have
yet to meet anyone who wants to be in
business to lose sales!).
Your
sales letter consists of primarily:
-
Headline
-
Sub-headline
-
Benefits vs. Features
-
USP
-
Free / Special Offer
You
have to find a headline that will grab
the attention of your visitors or else
they will not read the rest of your
sales letter. This is very crucial – the
headline will make or break your sales
letter!
Assuming, you’re selling an
instructional video on how to play
soccer professionally, so you must come
up with an attention-grabbing headline
for your product like the following:
“Learn To
Play
Soccer Like A Pro In Just 7 Days”
Visitors especially Soccer enthusiasts
(but not pros) would definitely stop
dead in their tracks and read on to
learn more about your product. Notice
the upper-cased and highlighted words.
WARNING:
Do not give false promises or mention
something you cannot or don’t intend to
deliver in your sales letter in the
attempt to get your customers to buy
from you. This is important business
practice regardless of any form of
business you are doing. For instance, if
this product cannot guarantee its
students to be a Soccer professional in
a week, then the product should be named
otherwise or not make into the lights of
the day.
The
sub-headline will encourage your
visitors to read further.
The
sub-headline will give a spark of hope
to Soccer player wannabes who couldn’t
help but think that their handicap is
stopping them from performing like an
Ace on the Soccer field and therefore
encourages them to read further.
Since
you’ve already got them interested in
reading your letter, the rest of your
sales letter must tell your potential
buyers about the benefits and features
of your product. For instance, you can
say that your product is the best out
there (assuming that is true). You can
back this fact by throwing in
testimonials from happy buyers who
benefited from your product, and
testimonials are indeed powerful.
If you
have a free offer that can help you
increase the chance of making a sale,
don’t hesitate to give! In this case,
you can give a free one-minute preview
clip of your instructional video for
your visitors to watch. Should your
visitors decide that this is for them,
they would buy from you.
Now,
isn’t that awesome?
Set up
an online payment processor
If you
sell something that you own or have the
rights to sell, then you need to have a
Credit Card Payment Processor. Credit
Card Payment Processors process credit
card payments for you and sends you the
proceeds on a fortnight basis via wire
transfer to your local bank account.
Some
reputable Credit Card Payment Processors
you must check out are:
Marketing
your online business
Now is
the time to market to your target
market.
Each
Internet Business Model is different.
Therefore, you don’t market each and
every one of them the same way. The
truth is, not all Internet Business
Models depend on a good search engine
listing. In fact, some of them are not
designed to be listed by search engines
at all!
That is
simply because each Internet Business
Models have different objectives and set
up. That also means they require
different marketing strategies and
tactics to make it work.
Not
knowing the different Internet Marketing
approaches that are available for
different Internet Business Models can
be expensive. It will result in spending
more time, money and effort than is
necessary for promoting your Internet
Business.
Here, I
share with you seven main ways to
generate traffic and get to your target
market:
Tracking sales and visitors to your
website
The
purpose of the last step is to determine
your conversion rate of visitors into
customers. This can be easily done if
your web host provides a site statistic.
A good
conversion rate from a Killer Sales
Letter is 1 to 3% (depending on the
price of your product). In other words,
for every 100 targeted prospects who
visit your site, at least one of them
will buy your product or pay access to
your service. If the conversion rate is
higher than 2%, then you are doing very,
very well with your Internet Business!
On the
other hand, if your sales letter’s
conversion rate is less than 1%, then
you will need to take quick action to
make your site sell more effectively.
You may have to do more compelling copy
writing, change the layout of your web
pages or simply get a better and more
attention-grabbing headline (which is so
vital that it can make or break a
sale!).
Whatever you need to do, you have to
increase your conversion rate from poor
to excellent!
To
track visitors, you can subscribe to
counter services if your web-hosting
doesn’t have a site statistic feature
built in. To track sales, check your
Credit Card Payment Processor
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