The development and expansion of the Internet has made business opportunities, once only available to the wealthy, available to nearly everyone. In the past, opening a business was a tough task in terms of finances and risk. Today in twenty first century competitive and techno savvy world, business opportunities and ideas are available to anyone willing to put in the time and effort to learn about the world of e-commerce. Best of all, you can start an e-commerce business with minimal funds and very little risk. We started the journey of E-commerce business establishment in last article now we carry forward the process to its final destination waiting in the form of happening E-commerce online business start. Just follow the steps discussed in below lines to complete the journey of E-commerce business registered in the online world. Establish A Business Entity
In order to conduct business, you need to establish a business entity. Fortunately this can be as easy as filing a “Doing Business As” or “Fictitious Name” form with your local County Clerk’s office to become a sole proprietor. When you arrive at the County Clerk’s office, they will check their records to make sure your intended business name is not already in use. If it’s available, you will need to complete the appropriate forms and pay your filing fee. Each state has different requirements. Check with your state for requirements on becoming a sole proprietor.
You will also need a sales tax id. You will need to charge sales taxes in the state where your business resides. Contact your county office for details about sales tax ID’s and any other requirements they may have.
Web E-Commerce Design
Now that you are a legitimate business owner, it’s time to open a business bank account. Take your court documents to the bank and open a business checking account. Most banks offer a variety of business accounts. Choose the one the best meets your needs. It’s usually best to start with their least expensive account because it could be a while before you start earning revenue. You can always upgrade in the future.
Some banks require a business owner to wait specified amount of time, usually 90 days, after the court documents are filed before opening a business bank account. These rules are in place to help prevent fraud. Check with your bank to obtain waiting period information.Choose A Domain Name
While you wait to open a bank account, you can start building your website. First, register a domain name. Names that end in “.com” are best. If possible your, domain name should include one or more of your target keywords. For example, if you are creating a yoga supply business, you’ll want to choose a name with the word yoga, such as yoga center.com, yoga-supply.com, or yogastuff.com.Create Your Website
One of the keys to successful e-commerce businesses is a professional website. Your website is the first and often the only impression your visitors will have of your business. A professional website can be the difference between your visitors viewing you as a home-based business operating out of your garage and a multi-million dollar business with hundreds of employees. Fortunately, you don’t need to be a web programmer to create a professional website. There are companies that sell professional website templates. You can get website templates for free, but it’s much better to pay for a highly professional template. To find these templates, simply search for “website templates”. You should expect to pay $50 – $150 for a good template with multiple pages and professional images or you can hire a website development firm like webdhoom.
Most website templates can be customized with common HTML editors and a simple graphics program. Templates can be edited without having to invest a lot of time and energy into learning how to code web pages. You’ll want your website content to target specific keywords. This can be achieved by creating articles, product reviews, product comparisons and detailed description of your products. Avoid repeating the keywords so often that the text becomes difficult to read. There is a fine line between good copy text and spam text. Spam text is designed to increase your site’s listing in the search engines, but often backfires when penalties are issued and your website is dropped from the listing.Host Your Website
Now that your website has been created, it’s time to find a company to host your website on their servers. You should be able to find a good hosting company for around $10 per month. This fee should include technical support and email accounts with your domain name. Domain name-specific email accounts are important for a professional image.
Your website files can be uploaded with a simple FTP program. The hosting company’s technical support personnel can walk you through the steps to upload your files and launch your website.Implement A Shopping Cart
No e-commerce website is complete without a secure shopping cart. There are many shopping cart options. Many e-commerce business owners make the mistake of using Pay Pal to accept payments, which immediately tells visitors that their company is very small and not professional.
Depending on your choice of a shopping cart, you may or may not need a merchant account to process transactions. Some shopping cart services allow you to use their merchant accounts for a slightly higher fee.Stock Your Inventory
Now that your website has been created, it’s time to stock your inventory. The first step is to find the manufacturers of the products you wish to sell. You can find this information by reviewing your competitor’s websites. Some of them may list the manufacturer with the product name or description. Once you have the name, you can search for the manufacturer online.
Contact the manufacturer and tell them that you are interested in becoming a distributor. Ask for a wholesale price list and an application. The price list will help you determine if the profit margins are high enough to justify selling their product.
You’ll want to ask the manufacturer the following questions:
- What is the MSRP (Manufacturer Suggested Retail Price) for the item?
- Am I required to sell the item at MSRP?
- What is your minimum order quantity/amount?
Some manufacturers will not sell to e-commerce businesses that do not have a brick and mortar retail location. If this is the case, you’ll simply have to find a company that manufactures a similar product and is willing to sell to an e-commerce business.
E-commerce Development
Now that your website is live and you’re open for business, it’s time to promote your website. If no one knows that it exists, you will not receive any sales. Most website visitors originate from search engines. Before search engines can list your website, they have to know that it exists. You’ll need to submit your website to search engines and directories such as Yahoo!, DMOZ, Excite, and others. Search engine submission programs and services are available, but they not effective. Most good search engines require websites to be manually submitted. They enforce this by displaying an image with a series of letters or numbers that automated programs cannot read. The code embedded in the image is required to submit your website.
Search engine algorithms are extremely complex. The ranking of a website in their search results depends on a number of factors, including keywords, density, back links, page rank, and other factors. After submitting your website to the major directories and search engines, the next step is to establish back links. When search engines crawl the web and find a link to your site, they count the link as a vote for your site. The more votes you have, the higher your site will rank. You can acquire back links by sending emails to other website owners and offering to exchange links. It’s very difficult for new websites to acquire back links. Most people prefer to exchange links with established websites. In a way, it’s a catch-22, but it can be done and the results are worth it.Starting your own e-commerce business is a lot of work. Making it successful is even more work, but the pay-offs can be rewarding. Thanks to the explosion of the Internet age, e-commerce business opportunities are now available to anyone with a computer, a few hundred dollars for start-up costs, some spare time and the desire to create a business. If you feel that you are not in position to complete the work then take services of experience and expertise available with web dhoom
