Are you interested in setting up your own online store? Opening an online business may seem daunting to those who aren’t technically savvy.
Customer preference for purchasing online has grown. Even if the epidemic sped people’s transition to doing business and buying online, these changes in consumer behavior are permanent.
If you want to cash in on this trend, this article will show you how to create a business with online stores for restaurants, retail brands, and service-based businesses.
Alright, so How To Start An Online Store doesn’t exactly fit into a nice category.
At the end of the day, How To Start An Online Store is a… unique way to think about making money.
It’s certainly possible to make money with off-the-wall businesses like this, but unless you’re interested in taking years out of your life to experiment on an unproven business model, I would look elsewhere.
My #1 personal recommendation if we’re talking about starting a fully-online business has got to be the Lead Generation & Ad Agency business models.
There are a handful of programs that teach you the ropes, but my #1 choice that combines both of those business models into one is the Digital Landlords program
But, if you’re hard-pressed to jump head-first into an off-the-wall business model, let’s continue on to my full breakdown of How To Start An Online Store.
How To Start An Online Store?
To start selling online, you must create an online storefront, often known as an eCommerce website or online order form. After that, you may begin receiving payments, setting up delivery, collecting sales tax, and selling your wares online.
Beginning your business from scratch or taking your brick-and-mortar business online will be easier with me by your side. I’ll help you get off to the right start. You’ll also know what marketing strategies to use with your online businesses.
1. Start With A Business Plan
Business objectives and strategies are laid out in detail in a business plan. Think of it as a guide that will help you navigate your way to success and any obstacles you may face.
Here’s an overview of what your business plan should include:
- Executive summary
- Business description
- Market analysis
- Competitive analysis
- Service and product line
- Operations and management plan
- Financial considerations
2. Know The Startup Costs
When launching an eCommerce store, entrepreneurs face a wide variety of initial costs. Working capital and liquidity may be monitored and assessed using proactive spending allowances.
3. Choose And Register A Domain Name
Find a catchy domain name and cash in on the booming eCommerce business. The name of your company should also serve as your domain. Get a domain name if you don’t already have one for your website.
You may purchase it directly from a certain eCommerce site, or you can use a domain registrar. Your domain should be your business name or anything related to your brand, products, or services.
A proper domain name should be brief and simple to remember. Avoid difficult-to-remember numbers, hyphens, underscores, and symbols.
4. Select Your eCommerce Platform
It would help if you considered the traits you’ll need to accommodate your business’s current and future development.
You may choose among plans with various levels of complexity, such as a real-time shipping rate calculator, integrated shipping labels, abandoned-cart emails for customers, gifting possibilities, and custom domains.
You should also check whether the product is available for shipment in the areas where your target audience lives—furthermore, the cheaper the shipping costs, the better.
5. Create And Customized Your Website
Whether you own a store, a restaurant, a service business, or any other company, you want your website to be professional and make sense for what you do.
A customizable online store builder lets you choose from a wide range of layouts to make your business look the way you desire it to be.
6. Take Secure Payments
Accepting payments online or in person is now a breeze with the help of several payment processing solutions. Adding a new payment option is simple and fast if you run an online business.
7. Manage Inventory And Drop Shipping
Avoid selling items out of stock by ensuring that your inventory management is consistent everywhere.
8. Shift Strategy To Include All Sales Channels.
Many shops are experimenting with new methods of operation, such as becoming wholesale, adding a new product line, or even switching to a whole other industry.
Using search engines makes those bets more likely to work out. Most of the money that retailers make now comes from online sales.
9. Make A Marketing Strategy
Marketing strategy gives you a clear picture of what you want and how you will do it. The greatest way to grow your business is to set goals and write down how you plan to reach them. This will help you build a profitable online store.
10. Put Together A Promotion Plan
It can be hard to sell online, but there are many ways small business owners can connect with their customers if they’re just starting out.
Are There Alternatives To Starting An Online Store?
Yes, there are plenty of eCommerce programs and resources to choose from if you want to pursue this business model. Here are just a few:
Is Starting An Online Store Legit?
Time for the $1,000,000 question: is How To Start An Online Store actually a scam?
I wouldn’t technically call it a scam, though others might.
It’s technically possible to make money with this program, so in that sense, it isn’t a scam.
No one is riding off into the sunset with your money, leaving you empty-handed… technically speaking.
But the second, more important question is: is How To Start An Online Store actually worth the investment?
My honest answer is that for most people out there, probably not.
There are countless other business models that are proven & easily scalable, so why risk it for… not an incredibly huge payoff?
I’d rather have a program with thousands of successful students & plenty of room for others to join.
If you’ve followed my blog for long, you know I recommend a few different programs depending on your skills & goals.
My current top choice is becoming a Digital Landlord, because you have a proven, systematic path to 6-figures, and you can do it from anywhere you want.
I’ve got friends in there that are posting deals from the middle of the woods in a camper van with their pet pig… which is kinda cool.
What Is My Top Recommendation In Making Money Online In 2022?
Alright, time for me to get real with my lovely readers for a moment:
I’ve personally tried all of the major online business models:
- I’ve sold fidget spinners through Amazon FBA
- I’ve drop-shipped a toilet bowl putting green on Shopify
- I’ve sold women’s health supplements via Clickbank affiliate marketing
And I made money with all of them, so trust me when I say: there is no “perfect” business model.
THAT BEING SAID: I would at least recommend you implement something that is tried and true, because I’ve seen TOO MANY people (including friends and family) get burned by stuff like How To Start An Online Store.
They come out of left field with some random idea, make it seem attractive, and then make themselves a quick buck by luring in unsuspecting people.
I’m not saying How To Start An Online Store itself is a piece of trash, I’m just saying you need to be very, very careful.
This is a big reason why I only recommend proven, tried and true business models, like Lead Generation & Ad Agencies.
There are a bunch of programs out there that teach you those skills, but my top choice is the Digital Landlords program.
Why? It has proven leaders with their own 7-figure businesses implementing exactly what they teach you.
I’ve also got over a dozen personal friends in there, so I feel comfortable telling you it works.
Whether you’re a complete newbie, or you’ve been around the block before but have never had that “big win” to propel you forward, their program works.
Here’s why:
1)Time: If you’ve got a spare hour or two each day, you can do this. If you want to drop everything and go all in, you can do this. More time obviously means faster results, but even putting in a few hours per day is enough to see real success.
And because of that flexibility, you don’t need to trade your time for money. Once the income starts, it’s recurring (for the most part).
That means you can take a month off, travel the country, pursue a passion project, chill on the beach, or charter a boat across the world.
But you can only do that once you’ve created an income stream that doesn’t require YOU to be there all day, every day.
2)Big Margins: With most businesses, you’re often going to have really slim margins. That means you need to hit a serious scale to make serious money.
Being a Digital Landlord, your profit margin is nearly 100%. Watch here to learn how.
Just a reminder: these Digital Rental Properties are worth (at a minimum) $500/mo in semi-passive income. And each time you create another one, your income increases, and the effort put into creating the next property decreases.
Best-case scenario, you have properties bringing in over $3,000+/mo on “auto-pilot.”
3)It’s Effectively Copy-Paste: Here’s my favorite part: once you have your first Digital Rental Property up, you can literally copy-paste another version of it and find another willing “renter” in a few days. DOUBLING your income doesn’t get much easier than that…
If you wanted to double your income with online shopping, you would need to exert time and effort. And I can guarantee you, that’s a lot harder than a few clicks & a phone call.
4)You’re Helping REAL People: My biggest gripe with online shopping is that you’re basically only helping yourself.
But when you’re a Digital Landlord, you’re helping solve REAL problems that people are ASKING for help with:
Small local businesses around the world need one thing: customers. Without them, their business would fall apart. If you can provide those customers, they’re going to be really happy – and they’re going to pay you for it.
You’re helping a struggling mother or father put food on the table for their families, put their kids through college, or simply live life a little bit more comfortably.
Having this type of impact on the world is what will help you sleep soundly at night.
So, the rest is up to you. You could keep looking at other off-the-wall business models like online shopping and maybe hit it big one day.
You could keep researching and researching for the next few months (or few years), never making a concrete decision.
OR, you can look deep inside, think about those dreams, hopes, & desires, and make the decision to ACTUALLY make it happen, just like it has for thousands of other students before you.
Making a fortune while actually helping real people that need it.
If this sounds like you, click here to see how it all works.
