Prosper Newsletter: December 2007 > Ecommerce
You understand that the following information is educational in nature and is not intended to be legal, accounting, or tax advice. You are responsible for your own financial decisions and should consult your own legal, accounting, and tax advisors before making your financial decisions.
Choosing a Topic for Starting an Internet Business
Are you looking to start a new Internet business? Do you already have an Internet business but think it may need a little adjustment as you seek to make improvements in the coming year? An Internet business doesn't have to be just for experts. Many people who run successful online businesses are not necessarily experts at what they do, but they are willing to put in the time and trouble to educate themselves to create a better business. Thomas Edison once said, "Success is ten percent inspiration and ninety percent perspiration." Having a great business idea is an important step and a good start to forming a successful online business; however, if you aren't willing to work to make your company successful, your bright idea won't profit you anything.
And just because you don't consider yourself an expert in a particular area, it doesn't mean that you can't become an expert. You too can create or improve a successful business around your interests and talents. People tend to work harder at things that interest them. One of the best ways to help get you on the right track is to catalogue yourself. Make a list of all of your talents, your interests, your skills, and your dislikes. Write down what you loved about your last job or your current job, as well as what you disliked. This can help you gain an idea of where your interests and aptitudes are, as well as where your weaknesses and disinterests lie. Knowing which areas and skill sets you gravitate towards can help you decide what kind of business venture you could be successful in (or what all-important tweaks you can make to improve your current business).
The Internet has opened up many possibilities for the anxious entrepreneur. Almost nothing is off limits for the creative and enterprising individual. Thousands of people are taking their interests and hobbies and making money from them on the Internet. Once you've narrowed down your focus to a particular area (whether that be an area for improvement or an area for new business development), do some research and see what is available in your general field. You might be surprised at the opportunities that are available for your interests and hobbies.
Once you've chosen a field of interest or area of improvement to focus on, be willing to educate yourself about it. Learn everything that you possibly can about every aspect of your chosen venture. Become an expert in the field, even if you weren't one at the beginning. This education can come in the form of formal education, such as taking classes, courses, training, or certifications, or it can come in the form of research, asking questions, reading about other businesses in your field, learning about the strengths and weaknesses of your field of interest, or in many other ways. Willingness to put in the time that it takes to educate yourself about your chosen field can go a long way toward creating a successful online business. So look around as the year winds down. You are sure to find new business ideas, ways to improve your current operations, and other ways that you can make improvement in your business ventures for the coming year.
I am thrilled at the progress I have made. I came into the eCommerce program with only a vision of what I wanted to create. Dan and the resource advisers have made my dream real. Since 1993 I have had an idea to develop a website that promotes a sober life style, but I had no direction on where to start. Then I was introduced to Prosper and Dan became my coach and all that has changed.
Dan has taken my idea and my vision and gave it life. His guidance, expertise and personal care and instruction have shown my wife and me how to take what seemed impossible to a Google keyword page ranking of 6 on the 1st page using only 2 keywords. Dan has helped me accomplish this in only 8 weeks since I launched my site.
Dan has given me the start I needed and now with the continued help, sometimes daily, of the resource advisers, my blog is functional. I am writing articles that are not only being published, but people are finding them and posting them to their site.
There is no way in the world I could have done this without Prosper. I have the deepest regard, both personal and professional, for my coach and the resource advisers. I owe them all my success.
Next year, when my daughter goes off to college I will pay her first year's tuition of $10,000 with the revenue from www.becomingwellnow.com.
Thank you Dan and Prosper
Robert P.
Are you looking for something to add to your new year's resolutions that will help you to quickly gain some ground on your competition? Think about submitting a press release. A press release about your site may help with your page rankings and search engine rankings. Most of your competition will not write press releases. So, this is one thing may help you get higher rankings faster. Also, if you are submitting about three releases each month, you are marketing your site in a way that will keep it high in the rankings.
Press release websites carry a high page rank. Also, when you actually submit a press release, you may have a very popular website link to your site (which improves your natural search engine rankings). Imagine what might happen if you were to submit three releases each month (you may do more if you wish). Over time, your website may become more popular than your competitor's sites.
When you submit a press release, make sure that each release is about something unique. Make sure that the focus is on a different topic or keyword. This will help your site get more traffic through search engines.
In addition, each quarter, one of your press releases should be a paid submission release. Sites like PRWeb® (www.prweb.com) have a submission service. For a fee, they will give you several anchored text hyperlinks to your website with your submission. Remember, do not submit just one press release and think that you are finished. You must think of this as a marketing technique that you should repeat as long as you have your website.
One last thing: create a Press Release Section on your website to archive all the press releases you have submitted. This will also help you keep your content updated. For example, if you are writing three releases a month, you should no problem keeping your website content current.
Do you have ideas for future newsletter topics, articles, and other related feedback? To submit your feedback, please send an email to studentnewsletter@prosperlearning.com. We will read and evaluate all comments that we receive, and we will try to incorporate your ideas and feedback into future issues of the newsletter. We hope to hear your ideas and interests, and hope you'll take advantage of this new service by sending us your feedback.
