ExecutiveChronicles.com | How to Start a Business Online | Want to know how to start a business online?
The allure of starting an online small business is a strong one. It’s fast and affordable to set up and doesn’t require any startup funding.
So what is the best way of starting an online business and making it successful?
Well, we’ve got your back. In this post, you’ll learn the 5 simple steps to building your business entity.
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Choosing Your Business Idea and Niche
When looking for a winning business idea and niche, there are three boxes it needs to tick:
- It needs to solve a problem for your prospective buyer
- People need to be willing to pay for your product
- People need to be able to afford what you’re offering
If your niche is able to tick all three of those boxes, then it’s a viable niche and business idea to go forward with.
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Validate Your Business Idea and Product
Once you feel you have found a good business idea, you need to validate your product idea by trying to sell either the concept of the product or the product itself to people before the product is made.
For example, let’s say you want to build an online course teaching people who to crochet. Before building the product, reach out to people you know who you think would be interested and see if they will pay you for it.
For a successful product validation, you need to have 3 people willing to pay for the product. This will save you months of wasted time.
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Build Your Product and Website
If you have successfully validated your product, it’s then time to start pushing ahead with the business. This is when you can start an LLC and begin building the product and creating your first website.
Websites and digital products can be very cheap to build nowadays, and you can often build them for free using sites like wix.com and Teachable.
Focus on developing your first draft of your product first. Don’t be a perfectionist, as it will only end up costing you time and potentially stop you from ever launching. Just get your product out to the public fast!
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Understand Online Business Laws
Although the online business doesn’t always require licenses and permits compared to a brick-and-mortar business, there are still several applicable laws:
- Will you be a sole proprietorship, LLC, or a corporation?
- Are there permits you’ll require?
- Is a sales tax license required?
- Do I need to comply with GDPR?
Each state and country will have different laws, so it’s important to seek help from local authorities.
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Launch Your Business
Once, you have your product and website created, it’s time to launch your website and driving traffic to your product. There are several different ways you can do that.
Paid methods:
- Paid ads (Facebook Ads, Google Ads, and YouTube Ads)
- Influencer marketing
- Search engine optimization
Free methods:
- Organic social media marketing
- Content marketing
- Email marketing
- Cold outreach
- Networking
If you have money to invest in your business, you can try paid ads. However, if you are on a shoestring budget, you can get incredible results from the free methods listed above.
Want to Know More About How to Start a Business Online?
We understand that when learning how to start a business online, you are inundated with information and it can be massively overwhelming.
We hope that this guide has simplified the process for you and shown you what is capable.
Did you get the answers you were looking for? If so, check out our website for more entrepreneur articles just like this!
