Sometimes it takes a good swift kick in the pants to get your attention…

…and that’s what I got this week while reading some of my favorite blogs. This site started as a journal of experiences I encountered while living and working in a connected world. Looking back over my last dozen or so posts, it has been anything but and I need to get back on track. So here goes. Let’s talk about…

Building My Online Business

For the first fifteen years or so of my professional career I worked in a wide variety of businesses; an international natural foods network marketing company, the second largest telecom company in the country, a printing company, even commercial software development. One of the reasons I was able to move from industry to industry so easily was because the underlying principles of technology were not dependent on what kind of widget was being pushed out the back door. A similar principle applies here.

Just because I have moved my business online doesn’t mean that those same underlying principles of good business practices and monetization don’t apply anymore, in spite of the way some online entrepreneurs act. Take the recent purchase of one mans goal dot com for instance. The buyer paid over $10,000 for a website with no organic product, no long tenured customers, no established monthly recurring revenue… just a name and a quasi-loyal following of readers. That’s like paying $10,000 for a convenience store that doesn’t sell anything but they have lots of people come in and look around everyday.

So How Do They Translate?

Good question. Off-line business principles make good online business principles. Things like keeping a low overhead, diversification, and return on investment still apply. Some are easier than others, take low overhead for example. It would be very easy to run a successful online business with a laptop and a digital camera. Neither are cheap but they are one time costs that will last for years. And even with a somewhat larger tech base than that, my overhead costs are very low…pretty much just the cost of Internet access.

Another of those principles that very few online business owners pay attention to is diversification, or having multiple streams of income. Why diversify? Oh, I don’t know. Lets say you are one of the eBay entrepreneurs and you’re making boatloads of cash off their affiliate program. That’s great. Now what if they pull the plug on it tomorrow, or at the end of the month? Would you be able to replace that income in 30 days?

Diversification of your online business simply ensures sustainability, another solid off-line business principle. If you had an off-line business selling widgets and you depended solely on one supplier for those widgets, what would you do if they went out of business? You have to bring the same mentality to your online business ventures.

How Am I Diversifying

Like most folks who decided they wanted to make money online, I threw up a blog and slapped some AdSense units on it, sat back and waited for my check! And waited…and waited…OH, A CLICK…for 2 cents. I got frustrated and moved on to something else. Now, with the help of the three wise men, I am working my way toward a better understand of AdSense and developing it into a significant stream of income…and it is quite a learning curve.

So while I’m working on that, I’ve recently taken a pretty large bite of the affiliate pie and added eBay to my online business portfolio. Now this is not really new for me, I’ve been signed up with the eBay affiliate program for several months…posting links and banners for them all over the place. But two things happened in the last month that have totally changed my outlook on eBay and their affiliate program and the part it plays in my online business.

The first is that eBay has brought management of their affiliate program in-house and out of the hands of Commission Junction. Now, I’ve never really had any beef with CJ, they’ve just never done anything for me…not one red cent. So I’m kinda happy that things are moving in-house with eBay. That said, they are experiencing some growing pains during the transition but hey, its eBay! Nuff said!

The second big development was my discovery of BANS or Build a Niche Store. BANS is a software designed to be loaded on your server to publish a “store like” website populated with products currently listed on eBay. Again, in the interest of full disclosure, I bought BANS back in March and built my one little store and sat back and waited for the money to start falling out of my PC. Needless to say, that hasn’t happened yet (but when it does you can bet I’ll shoot a vid and post it on Revver! lol). Anyway, back on April 7th, Vic over at BloggerUnleashed.com challenged us to build 100 BANS sites. That really got me thinking and I took the challenge!

The next day was my birthday so I made my present to myself everything it took to get the 100 sites built. I can now say that I have added 103 BANS sites to my online business and will be adding a few more each week.

So What’s Your Point?

The point is this. If those sites only average $1 a day each then that’s $103 per day and almost $3,100 / month or about $37,000 a year added into my online business coffers. Do I have your attention now?

Am I sitting back now with a bigger bucket waiting on money to start falling out of my PC? No, remember diversification? Now that I have the 100 BANS sites up, I’m working to improve my AdSense results, I’m looking for other affiliate programs, oh, and I’m getting links all over the freakin Internet!! And on the off chance that all of those options might not pay-out…I still have the bulk candy vending machines!

The bottom line is that an online business is still a business and you have to treat it that way. Its not a cool way to get to stay at home and work in your shorts, t-shirt, and flippies (but if you need any of those things, be sure to check out BloggerUniforms.info!) Seriously, you have to work like your next meal, or the light bill, or the cell phone bill depended on it.

Ok, I know this has been an epic post like you’d find on How To Make Money from Griz so I’ll go ahead and knock off here…but don’t stray too far because I have lots more online business tips to share. Things like getting a reseller account versus a regular hosting account, all the fun I had setting up BANS and at least one more post on some nifty little tools to help with all those sites.

Thanks for sticking with me this far and since you did I want to leave you with a challenge. If you are serious about having an online business, write down your goals for this year and three concrete steps you will take for each goal. And if you want to share them with the rest of us in the comments, we’ll all be pullin for you! It kinda works that way around here.

Peace.

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Well, it’s time for part 2 in the series about how to live and, more importantly, work IN the Internet. Last time we talked about getting the basics covered, email, website, etc (see How To Work In the Internet – Part 1). And as promised, this time we’re going to go over eCommerce and making a little scratch with an on-line store!

Getting Started…the EASY way!

Without a doubt, the easiest way to get involved in eCommerce, or selling stuff on-line, is eBay! You can sell anything there, honestly! You can even sell your car online at eBay! Now I know many of you don’t want to sell that out of your garage, but I bet there is something in there you can let go of…isn’t there. Whether its your garage, closet, storage unit, where ever – go take a look around, pick something out, and sell it! Before you know it, your on-line, ecommerce empire is up and running!

The up-side to using eBay to get started is that you don’t have to build anything. The website, bidding engine, buy it now engine, PayPal (see below), they are already there and working. It’s easy. Oh, and most importantly, they have the traffic! No real need for you to try to drive potential shoppers to your site, eBay does plenty of that for you!

There are two downsides to eBay. First, there may be some “stigma” to “only selling on eBay” kind of like, “oh, you don’t have a store, you just do garage sales?” If that kind of thing bothers you then you should look elsewhere as soon as possible. Me, I don’t care. I’ve know plenty of wealthy folks who got that way selling junk at garage sales. This is no different except we’re doing it on-line.

The second downside to eBay is that they have to make their money too, and they do that off the seller. eBay charges a variety of fees when you list your product for sale, whether it sells or not. The charges are usually small but they obviously cut into your profit. For that reason you might want to upgrade to your own store.

Click & Mortar, sans Mortar

After you’ve sold a few items on eBay, you may want to consider upgrading to an Internet Storefront. There are several options to do this and again we’ll start with the easy one. Again, eBay has an offering for you, from beginner to expert, they’ve got you covered. You can use this link to find out just how easy it is to open a storefront on eBay.com . The type of store you choose will be dictated by how big a part of your income you want this to be.

As with regular eBay auctions, a regular eBay store is an easy way to get all your products on-line and up for sale. If you don’t have or don’t want to spend a lot of time on your Internet Storefront, this would be a good option for you. If you’re ready to go up against Wal-Mart and Target, then you will want your Own Web Store at Your Own Web Address!. ProStores – yet another eBay company – has what you need.

If the eBay store doesn’t sound appealing to you, how about another giant of the Internet, Yahoo!? They have several options to choose from and you can use this link to compare web hosting packages from Yahoo! (BTW, you may want to find out What the Crap is Microsoft Thinking? if you’re leaning toward the Yahoo! option. Still a good option, you just need to know.)

Show Me the Money!

No matter which method you choose the most important part of having an on-line store is getting paid! Most options offer you a variety of choices but two are leading the pack, PayPal and Google Checkout.

If you go the eBay route its almost a no brainer, go with PayPal! After all, it is an eBay company and integration is tight and secure. After you get your PayPal account setup, you can even get a PayPal Debit Card to have quick access to your proceeds!

If PayPal isn’t for you then there is always the monster of the Internet, Google. You can use this link to .

Both options here will require a little setup and they both exercise a great deal of security in dealing with handling your money. It will be a hassle but VERY MUCH worth it in the end. So suck it up and drive on!

And That’s About It

All that’s left is to choose your weapon, find something to sell, and get after it. Good Luck!

Do you have an online store? Leave a link in the comments below and we’ll come check it out (i.e. FREE ADVERTISING!) Have questions? Comment below and if I don’t have the answer, the community here will. Oh, and don’t forget to subscribe to the feed to keep on top of whats going on here on jtrigsby.com!

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I had the very special pleasure of having lunch with my wife and my mom today (BTW, the Salmon Cakes at Super Suppers are GREAT!) While we were eating we chatted about what I’ve been able to earn on-line the past few weeks and I, quite by accident, stumbled upon something I hadn’t really realized before. Blogging is work!

I know I’ve said I’m trying to setup some passive income via the web as part of my grand experiment, but it is FAR from passive yet! My beautiful brides leaves the house by 9:30 most days (thus forcing me to get to work) and before I know it, its already 3:30 and the little one is home from school! Where did all that time go? Well, I don’t know about the rest of you but for me, it went into work!

Yeah, I know a lot of people would look at what I do and say, “that ain’t work, that’s just surfin.” Well brother, let me tell you. By the time I scan all my feeds in Reader, tag the ones I want to come back and read, look for interesting tid-bits for the blogs, research links for link posts, write some posts, check keyword counts, comment on others posts, answer emails, scan Craig’s List, update Facebook, and process orders from the eComm site… its a Full Day!

But hey, I’m not gonna complain, I could be out diggin a ditch, right!? I just have to remember to get up and stretch my legs every once in a while!

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The folks at RadBuy have worked out a deal with the good people at Facebook.com, a leading social networking site, to tie the two together! Now you can list, refer, and buy all from within Facebook!

Now we’re getting somewhere. Just like VisiCalc was a killer app and web browsers became killer apps, Facebook is now migrating into a new killer app. No longer is it only for keeping in touch with friends, it is now becoming a platform for eCommerce. Just think how your shopping habits will be effected when they tie in your moods, schools, employers, etc to filter and “suggest” products you might be interested in. For instance, it’s a reasonably good bet that if you live in the Dallas area you might be a Cowboys, Mavs, or Stars fan. Now filter NFL, NBA, and NHL products to put those teams on top! How about your favorite college, even high school teams? Where else could it go?

Mark Cuban has a great article about this topic on his blog, Blog Maverick.

So what does all this mean? I’m not really sure yet… but I bet it will be fun to find out!

-Thom

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