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By Nowshade Kabir
If you are planning to start a new business in 2005, you should seriously
consider one of the many Internet based businesses available today. The
online businesses have numerous inherent advantages in comparison to their
brick and mortar counterparts.
Investment is relatively small
The basic elements to start an online business are the followings: a good
product or service, an online presence, and a good marketing plan. All these
things can be done on a shoe-string budget. You won’t require more than US$
2000 to start any of the business described below. In most of the cases, the
investment can be even lower. Quick to launch
Once you know, what products or services you are going to sell, you can,
basically, start your business within three to four weeks. Some of the online
businesses don’t even take more than two to three days to start.
Large audience
Internet is big and it’s getting bigger! Whatever business you prefer to
start, Internet allows you to tap instantly into a huge number of potential
customers, which is, virtually, impossible to do with a brick and mortar
enterprise.
Huge growth potential
With the Internet, sky is the limit! If you have a good product, service or
idea, you can create a dot com behemoth over night! Smart guys are doing this!
Internet success examples are abound.
Work from home
The best thing about online business is you can take care of it even while you
are on vacation. No office is necessary; you work from home, if that is what
you prefer.
Less paper work
Since starting for your quotation and purchase orders to the invoices and
shipment tracking, everything is done online; you hardly have to do any paper
work. Check out an example of how easy it is to manage your business
processes online at http://www.rusbiz.com/deal_manage.html (http://www.rusbiz.
com/deal_manage.html)
Flexible time schedule
No longer have you had to work nine to five! You set your own schedules.
Although, with any new business, initially, you have to work very hard,
however, the time flexibility allows you to do other important things
whenever it’s necessary.
There is no limit to Internet business ideas. Savvy entrepreneurs are
constantly coming up with mind-boggling online projects and striking rich in
no time.
Here I have chosen several of the online businesses with great upward
potential with proven success history.
Selling information
If you are asked, what do you do on the Internet most of the time? The answer,
most probably, will be searching or retrieving information. You are not alone!
A survey conducted by Neilsen Media Research shows that Books and
Information Category tops the highest selling product and service on the
Internet with a significant margin in comparison to other categories. This
makes information a natural product for sale on the Internet. Information
sells online in the formats of e-books, articles, reports, data, whitepapers
etc. If you have expertise in any specific field, you may consider selling
your ideas in one of the mentioned format. Check out Clickbank’s marketplace
to get a good idea what people are selling. You will be truly amazed by the
scope of ideas!
Resources http://www.clickbank.com (http://www.clickbank.com) http://ezine.
rusbiz.com/article/13.htm (http://ezine.rusbiz.com/article/13.htm)
Travel agency
According to Jupitar Research the U.S. online travel market has grown at a
fast pace over the last year, totaling $54 billion in 2004, or 23% of travel
purchased. The online market is projected to grow to $91 billion in 2009, or
33% of travel purchased.
Apart from being a soaring market, travel agency is also highly rewarding and
satisfactory business. The interesting thing about this business is your own
network of acquaintances is also your potential customers.
The success of this business will depend on your target market and product
that you are going to sell. Choose a very niche product and focus on a
specific market segment. For example: Red Sea Rivera of Egypt is increasingly
becoming a primer destination for many sun worshippers. Try working with
several of the hotels from this area. Create package deals and offer to
European customers.
Resources ASTA http://www.astanet.com/index.asp (http://www.astanet.com/index.
asp) NACTA http://www.nacta.com/ (http://www.nacta.com/) OSSN http://www.ossn.
com/ (http://www.ossn.com/) ICTA http://www.icta.com/ (http://www.icta.com/)
eBay store
eBay has grown into the largest online marketplace in the world. Entrepreneurs
are taking advantage of this. Opening a store on the eBay is fairly easy.
However, the competition is stiff! There are nearly half a million stores are
selling almost anything you can think off. In order to be successful you have
to choose your products very carefully. The best selling items on the auction
marketplace are collectibles, books, computer software and hardware,
clothing, home and garden supplies, business supplies, wholesale lots, DVDs,
special events tickets and even cars and real estates. If you don’t have your
own products or you don’t want to physically handle a product, you can
consider selling drop-ship items.
The main reason why you should mull over selling your products through eBay is
the sheer number of visitors eBay gets. By no means, an average website can
bring you so many customers.
If you find difficulties doing the auction sales yourself, you can also
concentrate on seeking out products and selling them through eBay drop off
stores. You can also come up with your own drop off store.
Resources http://www.entrepreneur.com/ebaycenter/0,6316,,00.html (http://www.
entrepreneur.com/ebaycenter/0,6316,,00.html) http://www.i-soldit.com/ (http://
www.i-soldit.com/) http://www.quikdrop.com/ (http://www.quikdrop.com/)
Web service firm
Services required by the Internet users and online businesses are increasing
enormously. The Internet service industry is evolving so fast that for their
various requirements, many companies, today, prefer outsourcing as oppose to
doing things by hiring employees.
Large and small companies started to realize that it’s more cost-effective and
time-saving to outsource sophisticated business related services, which are
not their core business. This has created a flourishing industry, part of
which did not even exist several years ago.
To be successful in this market you have to know what’s the odds are. A rush
to provide complex solutions of vast range that fail to provide benefits at
reasonable costs for businesses will sure take you out of business very fast.
The services that you can provide may include: Website design Website
promotion Online security consulting
Resources http://ezine.rusbiz.com/topic/4.html (http://ezine.rusbiz.com/topic/
4.html) http://www.hwg.org/ (http://www.hwg.org/) http://www.webreference.com/
(http://www.webreference.com/) http://www.guru.com/ (http://www.guru.com/)
Export Import Business
Thanks to the Internet, getting into import export business has never been
easier. As the nations are accumulating wealth, their demand for foreign made
products is also swelling. You can be a part of this action too! Whether you
are planning to import or export, Internet resources can be of great help too
you. The trade leads site, B2B exchanges and various marketplaces have made
sourcing and selling products and services globally simple, effective and
inexpensive. You can also create your web store with many of the B2B
exchanges and run your business processes solely online.
Resources http://www.itintl.com/ (http://www.itintl.com/) http://ezine.rusbiz.
com/article/24.html (http://ezine.rusbiz.com/article/24.html) http://www.
alibaba.com (http://www.alibaba.com) http://trade-leads.rusbiz.com (http://
trade-leads.rusbiz.com) http://marketplace.rusbiz.com (http://marketplace.
rusbiz.com) http://www.export.gov/ (http://www.export.gov/)
Bonnie Jo Davis is the author of the new special report “Articles That Sell:
Use The Best Kept Secret Of The Internet To Promote Your Business For FREE!”.
To learn more about Bonnie and her favorite free marketing tactic visit http:/
/www.articlesthatsell.com/ (http://www.articlesthatsell.com/).
Bonnie@ArticlesThatSell.com (mailto:Bonnie@ArticlesThatSell.com)
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