subject: Five Things To Avoid In Building An Online Business [print this page] Building a business online can be very rewarding, but there are some things you can do (or fail to do) which will cause your business to fail, and fail quickly. Here's a list of five things you need to avoid.
Lack of Research. The worst type of business is one which is selling to a non existent market. The internet age is a blessing because it is easier to find out what people are searching for on the net than it has ever been before.
Google for example has a number of free search tools which allow you to find out what people are searching for and how often. But that's just the start. Once you find out what people are looking for, you need to find out where they are getting it.
Understanding the competition, it's size, scope and degree of specialization, is a crucial factor in the decision of what and where to sell.
Lack of Decision. If you do your research properly you'll find you end up with a lot of information which can be difficult to sort. It may be different to decide between products which you have an interest in but which don't appear to sell well, and products which you know nothing about but which look like good prospects. Sometimes the reaction to too much information is indecision. Like a horse between two carrots you can't decide which way to go, so you stay still. There's an old saying; nothing ventured, nothing gained. This is as true on the internet as it is anywhere else.
Lack of knowledge. There's a huge amount to learn about selling on the internet. While it may be wise to hire experts to help with the various stages of getting your business up and running, you will need to learn the terminology and technical challenges of the interwebz, even if only to define your outsourcing goals. There are many many scams waiting to drag you in.
One of the main ways to make money on the internet is by teaching others. Many of these teachers have made fortunes on the internet, but not by doing what you plan to do. Their knowledge and income is all based in telling people how to make money online, not in actually doing it. Many of their expensive courses are actually just long sales pitches for yet more expensive courses.
Lack of Patience. Webstores don't start selling overnight. A new web store can easily take months to establish, during which time there may be very little traffic unless you use pay per click ads to bring visitors to your site. As you develop your site you'll expect changes to take effect, but it could be two, three weeks or even more before a web site change has any real effect.
Lack of Money. Cash flow is king. All online businesses cost money to run, some more than others. You need to be sure you don't run out of money to run the business before the business starts making money. No one can tell you how soon that will be, but its very rare for any business to make money straight away, and some take over a year to make any real income.
