5 Tips for Starting a Web-Based Business

There could be desire to be independent, to work for oneslf, to write perhaps or start a blog.
Of course too a desire for any business, online or otherwise, for it to be profitable.
But is making money the sole motivator ?
You will find some interesting tips here.

Before profitability, however, there are some ground rules to follow for a successful, and in particular online business venture.

5 Tips for Starting a Web-Based Business
There are many issues to think through and things to take into account before you get your business off the ground. Even though you’re thinking about launching an online business, it’s still not an easy venture. Web-based businesses fail because entrepreneurs fail to realize the magnitude of the work ahead of them. However, it is obvious that ‘online or web-based business’ is a new category of entrepreneurship, which has arisen with the boom of social media, with many successful entrepreneurs who began their careers by launching an online business.
The fact is that more than 2 billion people log onto the Internet every day. There’s more than enough people that can fall into your target audience category, but that’s exactly what made online entrepreneurship a modern-day gold rush. Thus, we present you with some valuable tips on how to launch a successful web-based business.

1. Organizing your web assets.
The term ‘web assets’ covers everything from your hosting account to your social media profiles to your website. All of them need to be active, organized, in order, and under your control. These assets are what defines your online brand, and what is used for building it, thus need to be optimized. Your web pages and social media, for example, should have all the relevant keywords, be updated with the latest company info, and fall into an integrated marketing plan. Choose to keep your information on a cloud-based storage, as you can access it from a remote location, and will have it better secured than by keeping it on a private server.

2. Protect the online reputation of your brand.
Failing to realize the importance of your online business’ reputation can be detrimental to your business because the smallest mistake can taint your brand forever. By setting a Google Alerts notification for your online brand, you’ll be able to inspect any mention of it. The key lies in control. Create a set of social media and branding guidelines, so anyone of your employees posting on behalf of your brand knows to do what’s expected of them. Adopt a problem-solving mindset and learn to deal with complaining customers, even though they are wrong.

3. Know your competition.
In order to know why the customers choose others over you, and vice versa, you must get to know who you’re competing against. Also, you should study their business models and strategies, so you would know how to improve your own business, and manage to keep track with them. This is more important in the online world than anywhere else. Inspect what Social media channels your competition uses to reach their target customers, and inspect their keyword usage.

4. Keep track of the latest trends.
The online world is different than the real world, as it is constantly evolving and changing. Social media trends change faster than anything you’ll see in the real world, and you have to stay on top of this in order to be on the cutting edge of online branding and marketing. Track social media trends by paying attention to platforms with the largest built community (Tumblr, Reddit, Instagram), and tools like Hootsuite, Geofeedia, Top-Hashtags, and Google Trends.

5. Test and refine
Once you create a plan and have it implemented, you need to study what really works and what doesn’t. Now, you can try to implement other people’s advice or whatever you find online, but nothing is better than when you test things by yourself. Use all the available tools to find out what is your best-selling product, what kind of posts have been your most popular, and which social network is giving you the most referrals. Constantly test what you’re doing, as it is crucial to your growth and further success.
Did you know that startups take 3-5 years (in average) before they start turning into any profit? Only a handful of businesses become overnight successes, so if you want to enter the business world, you have to accept it and keep being persistent. If you do the right things and not give up, everything will pay off. Eventually, ideas fail, and it’s also important to know when an idea has failed in order to call it quits and move along if necessary.

“Nate Vickery is a business consultant and an online author mostly focused on startup and SMB marketing. He is also an executive editor at :