Idea:
The first step in making anything new is to have an idea. Ideas are very important because you want to spend so many time around your idea. It is better to have an idea that has the winning potential and you 100% believe in it. If you don’t believe in it then you can’t and won’t convince others to believe in your idea.
If you are reading this post it means you already have an idea. You want to learn the steps in making it live online and market your business to your audience.
- Find a need and fill it.
- Write copy that sells.
- Design and build an easy-to-use website.
- Use search engines to drive traffic to your site.
- Establish an expert reputation for yourself.
- Follow up with your customers and subscribers with email.
- Increase your income through back-end sales and upselling.
Have a Mission
Whatever your idea is you have to have a mission and your business and online network should form around your mission. For instance my mission is to help people become self-employed business owners that do what they love to do every day and make their -dream life- a possible reality.
Through your mission you can define your consumer. Once you define your consumer, your mission helps you connect with them.
Let’s say you are a fitness coach. You want to establish an online business. You see there is potential in helping new mom’s to get fit and gain their “before pregnancy” body back. You decide to offer online training plans and books. Your mission becomes helping new mothers to get fit and give them back their confidence which leads to happier and healthier lifestyle.
Reading this mission statement you can easily see who the audience is. In this case “New Mothers”. Now, how you can connect with them? By showing what your mission is and how you can help mothers to get fit and healthier.
So as you can see it is very important to have a mission that helps a group of people in some ways. There should be a reason for them to come to you. The better and stronger the mission the less you should be worried about pricing. You have to think of the value you want to serve. The more value in your services the more you can charge.
Keep in mind that your audience does not include everyone. So it is completely ok and normal if your services or products are too expensive for some, or if they can’t see the value in it. But you definitely need to make sure the audience you want to reach understands your services and the value in what you are offering.
Now that you have a pretty good idea about your mission, audience, and your product let’s build your online presence.
Website
The first thing you need is a website. There are few solutions for that.
You can hire someone to build your website for you which is a bit costly but takes away the headache of going through technicalities and boring stuff. Although you can’t just trust anyone with your site. You need someone to have a great knowledge of business and marketing as you need to have everything built right for your website’s SEO in order to be found by search engines. If you decided to go through this route contact me and I’ll help you with more information in this regard. (Click Here to Contact Me)
Another way is to use cheaper solutions like Weebly and Wix websites that give you a pre-built website. Every website’s needs are different. While these solutions can be good for some I highly recommend using WordPress platform for your website.
WordPress is proven to be the best solution in the industry and it is used by big brands and companies. It serves your need of having a website with a professional look. It also gives you the ability to make changes to the content of your site whenever you want without the knowledge of code.
There are both versions of free and paid wordpress themes. Depending on which look you decide to go with, you can select between the many available options. The good thing about wordpress is that whenever you decide to change the look of the website the content stays the same, you just easily switch the look. Of course depending on the theme you would need some adjustments but you won’t loose any content or you don’t need to copy and paste your content to the new website.
Domain name:
It is recommended to have one of your keywords in your domain name. Pick something that is memorable. Your domain name should make sense in order for people to understand and remember. Having a keyword in your domain makes it easier for search engines to understand what your website is about and has good effects on your SEO (search engine optimization). But as you know there have been domain names and very successful businesses who have broken this rule. It is up to you on which root you want to go. But the points that I’ve mentioned help a lot for brand awareness and to start in a better position when your business doesn’t have much history for people to recognize it.
I know it is going to take some time to find a name that is not taken and suits your business. Unfortunately many names are taken and it is a bit hard to find something that you can purchase. Take your time as this will be the name that you want to stick with for hopefully many many years.
Setting up your site and installing WordPress:
Login to your hosting account and go to your control panel. Click on the website icon and enter the domain name where you want to install your site. Once you click on Install button you will have access to your wordpress site..
Choosing a theme:
Now you can choose a look for your site. There are many designs available that are done by professionals. You have the option of both free and paid versions.
To see the free designs login to your wordpress site to see the backend where you can make changes. Type your domain name in the browser like this: “yourdomain.com/wp-admin”
Once you login you will see your dashboard. On the left you have your menu. I recommend going through each to explore your options.
To change the look of your site on the left panel select “Appearance”. More options will open, then select themes. When you click on themes you will see your many options on the right side of the panel. All you need to do is to select the one design you like. Click on Install Now and then Activate.
As I mentioned earlier you can change your theme later on without loosing any information or posts on your site.
To view your site, you can simply type in your domain name in the browser.
I have to add and mention that this solution is a good start but it would be a great idea to ask a professional to help you and have your site done and make it keep and running for you. There are some benefits with that.
1) you don’t need to put time to learn and build your site.
2) a professional knows SEO strategies they have to use in order to make your site visible to your audience. At the end you want to make money through your website and the only way is to bring your audience and customers on your website. There are many things you have to take care in order to make your online business successful.
Success comes with knowledge and experience. It takes time. There are things you have to do as a start point, then you need to gather information and make changes accordingly. Purchasing of this book is a great first step to give you a starting point. Now that you have your site up and running it is time to show your business online to your audience. Keep in mind that in order to have a successful online business there are many factors you have to consider. There are strategies to help you put your business online in front of your audience. It doesn’t matter if your business is purely online or if you have a business like a restaurant, salon, photography, dentistry,.. It can be anything and still you need to follow these strategies in order for your consumer to find you.
Read my articles to learn more about these strategies. How you create a thorough marketing strategy for your business.
