The Art Of Starting, Developing, and Maintaining an Online Business

By: Keith Adams

Have you ever tried to start your own business online? Did you make money? Well, if you didn't, I'm sure I could tell you why not...assuming I had enough information regarding the process you took.


In order to build a successful business online, one must be sure to be very systematical in their approach, or they are doomed for failure. This process involves certain steps that include: Most importantly, a sound idea as to which direction you want to take your business in. What exactly do you want to do? Sell products? Your own products or someone elses'?


The next thing you need to do is get the appropriate service providers lined up (of course, this assumes you already have a computer which is pretty important). Get a domain name registered, find a company to host your site, and now you are ready to design your site.


Most good web hosting companies provide you with great tools to do this, like Dreamweaver or Frontpage, so you can really tinker with your site until you get it exactly to your liking.


Once you are up and running, it's time to submit your site to as many directories as you can, and you can get a neat little software program that can help you do that for free, just google in directory submitter and voila! After that, you need to start trying to exchange links with as many websites as you can. At first, they don't really need to be relevant to your site, but in time you will want to emphasize the relevancy factor. But the main goal is to get as many links to your site as you can in the beginning.


You want to make your site as visible as humanly possible, and the more links, the more visible you are going to be.


Once you get rolling on that, you can move right along, and start advertising your site. If you can't afford the big wigs, like google and Yahoo!, there are a lot of free online ad placement agencies that are just dying to get your email address. Put out as many ads as you can, and you will see, visitors will start trickling in. If you have a solid product or service they will be back.


The main ingredient, you see, in any successful internet venture is PATIENCE! Rarely is there such a thing as an "overnight sensation" on cyberworld. Success is brought about by a go-getter attitude, motivation to succeed, and most importantly patience.


It takes time to build up a high page rank. It takes time to create a lot of one-way links to your site. I know a lot of people, and I was guilty of this years ago, that get into this with all kinds of energy, and give up because they hadn't made any real money in the first few weeks. Remember the story of the Tortoise and the Hare? It wasn't the sprinter that wins the race...it was the one going at a steady pace.


Rome wasn't built in a day either.