How do you start a successful online business?

How to Set Up an Online Store

There’s so much to consider when setting up an online store that it can seem downright overwhelming to a would-be ecommerce entrepreneur. From the little details to the bigger ones, you as the owner are responsible for all of it – and practically every last decision point could be treated in an article of its own. Think of this, then, as an overview of the process.

Before you even take the first step of going into business online, you need to ask some of the same questions you’d ask when going into any business. Do you have something to market? That is, can you give your customers something they want, for which they’ll pay you enough money for you to turn a profit? It doesn’t have to be a specific product; it can be a service, or it can even be a combination of the two. One entrepreneur I know writes and maintains custom software for small businesses, blurring the line between a product and a service.

Once you’ve decided what kind of online business you’re getting into, you need to choose a domain name. This is fairly important, since it will be your company’s online identity. Think of Amazon, for example. The point is, all of your customers will remember your URL, so you want to choose one that will stick in their heads, and give a favorable impression. If you’d like to read more about choosing a domain name, there are a number of articles on the subject, including one here on Web Hosters.

So, you know what you’re going to offer for sale, and you’ve chosen your domain name. What’s the next step? You want to register your domain name, and you want to put together a website that will encourage your customers to trust you and buy. Never mind articles; there are literally books that cover the topic of good website design

Building the Site

Here you have several options. If you’re a programmer or website designer (or would like to become one) you could build the site yourself from the code up. Or you could use DreamWeaver or some other HTML editing program to help you build it. You could hire someone else to do it for you. Or you could find and purchase some readymade website templates.

There’s a lot to take into consideration when building a website, whether you’re doing it from scratch or basing it off of templates. Obviously it should be professional-looking. The actual appearance will depend on what exactly you’re selling. Some of the factors you should take into account when setting up your website include:

• How many products do you wish to display? Too few can leave you with a bare-looking website, while too many can look busy and overwhelming to visitors.
• What type of products are you selling? That’s going to affect how many you display, as well as how you display them. You wouldn’t want to display basic furniture in the same way you display highly detailed jewelry, for example.
• Do you have digital pictures of the products? If not, can you obtain them? And are they of a quality that shows off the products to their best advantage? (You should also consider how quickly these pictures will load; you might have to settle for some kind of compromise between highly detailed pictures and faster loading).
• Include item descriptions, prices of items, and discounts (if applicable). Your customers will definitely want to know this information! In order to keep this data up to date on your site with a minimum of hassles, you might need a database or content management system from which the site can pull information.
• You might already have this set up if you’re taking a bricks-and-mortar business online, but you need to keep in mind all of the information that your database requires so that you can keep track of your products and sales. This might include the item number, product ID, a description of the product, and its price. You might also need to know its weight, at the very least so you can calculate shipping costs.
Obviously, if your online business is service-oriented rather than product-oriented, some of these points won’t apply to you. But you still need to build a website that is easy to navigate and not confusing to your customers. You need to tell your customers clearly what to expect from your business.

That’s the first step in building trust; it’s important in any business and even more important for an online business where customers often don’t interact with a real person (even in email) before deciding whether or not to place an order.

Choosing Your Web Host

This is a site dedicated to web hosting, after all, so you knew we’d get to this topic sooner or later. Again, there are plenty of articles on this topic (and you can find a few of them on this site). Right now I’m going to cover, very briefly, some of the things you need to look for in a web host, if you want to give your online business startup the best chance of success.
If you’re going to handle any kind of financial transactions through your website, you need to make sure your web host offers secure servers. This means that they offer SSL encryption. You should find out whether your prospective web host offers SSL encryption as part of its regular package or charges extra for this service.

When your website is your storefront, if your website is down, your store is closed – or worse, effectively nonexistent. So you need a web host that offers at least a 99 percent uptime guarantee (and will provide some kind of compensation if it doesn’t live up to its guarantee, so it has some incentive to keep its word). While asking about a web host’s uptime guarantee, you might also inquire as to its back up systems in case of emergencies.

You will also need a private CGI-BIN directory if you are conducting ecommerce through your website. It is into this directory that you upload binary scripts and/or interactive programs. These kinds of programs are involved with payment processing and shopping cart management.
Even small offline businesses try to keep track of customer information and sales records; indeed, if the business is big enough to pay taxes, this is essential. Online businesses have a somewhat easier time of it, since web logs and statistics give them the raw data they need (which of course still needs to be processed and analyzed). Make sure your web host will give you access to your web logs.

How comprehensive is the hosting company’s customer support? You want a company that will offer 24/7 support. May companies say they provide that level of support, but what about the quality of support? This is something you may have to research online at the various web hosting forums. Web hosting customers will be quite forthright in the condemnation of a bad host.

Of Payments and Shopping Carts

Obviously, this is one part of the business you have a strong incentive to get right. There are a number of options here. You can buy an online shopping cart program. You can use the services of an application service provider (ASP) to manage a shopping cart system for you. Or you can program a shopping cart yourself. Some web hosts offer a shopping cart program you can use on your website; you might want to look into that as well.

Googling “shopping cart services” (without the quotes) turns up hundreds of millions of web pages. You might find it is worth shopping around to compare prices, features, and customer service. If you have friends who engage in ecommerce, you might also check with them as to their shopping cart services.

Buying a shopping cart program can be an expensive option; you can expect to spend at least $200 if you choose that route, and some shopping carts cost $800 or more. Some shopping cart software might seem affordable at first, but then the company charges you extra if you want certain plug-ins (such as one that lets you display the shipping rates from all the shippers you use at the same time). You might want to put this off until you are more established and have a good idea of what shopping cart features are most important to you and your customers.

Your best option might be following through with a decision you may have made earlier, when you built your website: using ecommerce website templates. Many of those have shopping cart systems pre-installed. They make setting up an online store quick and easy.

Shopping carts bring up the issue of how you will accept payments. If you are doing business on the Internet, you’ll want a way to accept instant payment from your customers. PayPal might work for a while when you’re starting out, but you’ll need a more direct way to accept credit cards. That means you’ll need a merchant account from a bank or financial institution that accepts Internet transactions
I haven’t covered everything involved in setting up an online business, but I hope I’ve given you some idea of what’s involved. Take it step by step, and you’ll be on your way to success!

Vera Chandler
Get all support and a perfect start at http://www.domain-name-register-store.com/