How To Start A
Highly Successful Business

Whether you are a programmer, a writer, a hobbyist, a housewife, or an entrepreneur - you will easily find a way to start a business online.

The first thing is to get an idea that sells. Here is how to do it!

1. Sell things that people are looking for in your niche; but before you start, it's important to establish a business plan.

Tips : your product must have something different from the crowd. For example, you can sell golf balls bought from wholesalers but there are already hundreds of golf ball competitors so to be different why not sell autographed golf balls or add a free tee. Somehow your golf balls have to be different and create a reason for people to want to buy from you instead of from someone else.

2. Your Domain Name is very important when setting up a website for your business. You can get the greatest ideas in the world but if your Domain Name isn't easy to remember and if it isn't a dot .com, it will be harder for people to find you online. Make sure what your Domain Name contains keywords to let the search engines know what your website is about. In other words, if you are selling golf balls, it is ideal to get a Domain Name with the words "golf balls" in the name as opposed to something like "round and white" or that would not be representative of what people are searching for.

3. Your logo design is also important. Get your logo professionally designed for your business because that's how your audience will recognize your product. If you are good in Photoshop or another designing program, you can design your logo youself. Tips for DIY: Search Google images with (your key word + logo) where you can get some inspiration for your logo, then subscribe to a royalty free image websites to make sure the picture is not copyright protected.

4. Having a quality website for your busiess is equally important. The first thing visitors see when they will land to your website is if it's been designed professionally or if it was designed like a personal website. It takes people less than 2 seconds to decide whether to leave your website or stay. Some people can get away with building a mini-site or a splash page for their business. If you're selling multiple digital products, I highly recommend mini-sites. If you are selling courses, software, or coaching services, splash pages with a video presentation can do wonders. However, if you're selling physical products that require delivery by a post office or another shipping service, I don't recommend mini-sites but you will need a website that isseveral pages long that also contains contact information, FAQ's, Shipping information, terms and conditions, about us pages, etc...

Non-digital products need to build their visitors confidence on what they are going to buy and make sure that the product will be delivered in good condition, be on time and that it will be delivered right to their door. So several pages can explain all of this and provide them with a sense of trust.

Tips : Always look at other websites for inspiration, so you don't have to re-invent the wheel. Take a piece of paper, draw your web page with your logo, tables, contents, links, and maps.This draft will be useful when you will start editing your homepage with your software or when you contact a developer to help you build your website.

5. Your website's title and content is very important for SEO (Search engine Optimization.) Always add your main keywords into your title, subtitles and content. Do it naturally so you aren't spamming. The title is the first thing that visitor will read so it must be very attractive. There are a lot of marketing articles on the web about this.

For mini-sites, the content is different than regular websites. They are more aggressive and push buyers to take action rather than by subscribing to their list in exchange of a free report or rather than buying their products instantly. You will need what we call a professional sales letter. You can do this yourself if you're good at writing and marketing, or you can hire a copywriter on places like elance.com, fiverr.com or getafreelancer.com for example.

For regular websites, content must be more like a shopping site that contains pictures, description of your products, benefits, prices, a money back guarantee, etc...

Tips for marketing: Be sure to add an opt-in email form and offer something interesting for free to your visitors. Include testimonials on your website, provide a money back guarantee, include bonuses, special offers, sales, and price reductions, add an affiliate program, and provide a phone number or a live chat feature on your website to show that you provide excellent customer service. All of these features will boost sales and increase your conversion rates.

Most online businesses use Paypal for their payment processes as it's really easy to set up and start accepting credit cards. Paypal has buttons you can copy and paste directly on your website and they offer the ability to accept credit cards as well. They don't charge monthly fees and their transaction fees are very low. However, if you don't want to setup PayPal, there are lots of other merchant processors you can use to be able to accept credit cards online.

If you're a big online company you can subscribe to an online bank for transactions with credit cards but you will need to spend more fees and send several documents to get approval from the bank.