It is a miracle how the most successful home business websites have so much in common, despite of the fact that they look so different. This cannot be a co-incident.
One common feature is that these successful sites are likable and somehow easy to use. Everything looks so clear, so it is easy to judge whether you like it or not.
They look so simple, that I often ask, what special they have and how they have become so successful? It seems that the simpler and the more user friendly the site is, the better chances it has to create big sales.
Very clearly one big success factor is that the finetuning work should concentrate to take away all the unnecessary elements and non-selling links.
1. Winning Element: Attention Grabbing Title.
The title is absolutely the most important element of the site. It should contain the promise and to describe the content of the site.
A Great Title informs in a catchy way that this website includes the benefits about this topic.
The headline should be written well and it should stand out from the rest of the copy. It also should be the first element, which catches the visitor attention in seconds, because if it does not do that, the visitor continues the surfing.
2. Winning Element: Well Written Copy.
The Internet is the information highway, so the role of the copy is very important, this is the world of the words. The copy should draw the readers attention immediately to the benefits your offer give to him.
The style is important and the target is to build up the trust from the first contact. The copy should make the reader enthusiastic about the benefits but it should not use hype style overpromises, because they will destroy the trust.
3. Winning Element: Easy Site Navigation.
This is the technical must, because nothing drives the visitors away faster than the bad navigation. The site structure should be clear and logical, so that the visitor knows all the time, where he is and to where he could go from here.
The menu should be the same on every page and clearly accessible and also easy to understand. The terms should be clear, despite of the fact that you may want to use internet home business keyphrases.
4. Winning Element: Call To Action.
After the copy has presented the main benefits it is the time to call the reader into action. The clearnes is important. The visitor hates the situation, when he does not know, what to do next so it is better to call him to action and not to leave him guessing? Action is everything and we have to call the reader to do that.
One good way is to lower the bar, i.e. to offer a cheap or free trial opportunity for some weeks, before the reader will buy the product. The efficiency is the better, the more often you call the reader into action.
5. Winning Element: Images.
One picture tells more than thousand words. You should include photos of every product you sell, because they make the products more real, than the copy alone.
To make the navigation easier, you can use thumbnails instead of big images, which link to larger images. This speed up the page loadings.
6. Winning Element: Optin Form.
Most of the internet home business visitors needs at least five contacts before they will buy. It is important to get the website visitor`s name and email address in the early stage, because otherwise they can leave the site and you will never see them again.
In this process you have to give them a gift, an email course, a free e-book or something like that, which again will sell your offer later on. Now you can send them messages during a long period of time, which clearly makes the process more productive.
7. Winning Element: About Us Section.
The idea of every internet home business site is to build trust over a long period of time. This requires that you tell enough about yourself and give your contact information for further questions.
All big home business brands are build by stories, so can you also do. The idea of the story is to give enough information about you and to show that there is a real person working for the customers. This shows people that there is a real people behind the business.
8. Winning Element: Site Freshness.
People and search engines love unique, fresh information. A successful home business website goes through regular changes and additions. The visitor sees immediately that it is up to date.
It is useful to look the competing sites in your internet home business niche, because they are a great source of new ideas. Another idea is to make sure your site can stand out from the crowd.
The marketing is very important but the key is still the quality of your internet home business site. It makes the people to come back and it is the real place, where they can reach you and your offers.
With the right guidance, an Internet business can start generating income almost immediately. A home internet business can be very successful for people who have the dedication, skills and patience to await agradual increase in business and income. There are several ways how an internet business can be started. However, no matter which internet business is being initiated, it won’t make an impact at first.
The start up costs for an internet home business are next to nothing compared to the offline world of business start ups. In fact it is a lot more simple to start and grow a business on the internet. Of course you need some knowledge to begin your internet home business enterprise. But you don’t need a “Bacc” to do business on the web.
All you need is some computer knowledge and some internet marketing basis and a good dose of determination.
Here is some basic tips on how to start an internet home business.
== 1.Write Your Business Goals ==
It is important to set goals and objectives and then take action to accomplish them. This will be your Business Plan.
Here Are Some questions you should ask yourself:
- Why do I want to start up an Internet Home Business?
- What product or service can I provide?
- Do I have the knowledge and expertise to provide this service?
- Do I know enough about the competition?
- Where will my customers come from?
Take the time to write down your questions and answers and thoroughly research your chosen market.
== 2. Choose A Product or Service To Sell ==
On the internet you can find hundreds of product or services to sell.
You can sell your own product by creating your own, or purchasing resale rights or being an affiliate with a good internet company.
Don’t put your personal gains first. Make sure that the product will deliver what it promises. When you promote a product that leaves the buyer dissatisfied, you’ ll only be ruining your business. So sell solutions and the money will come.
== 3. Business Domain Name ==
One important first step is to choose the best domain name you can. Keep it as short and simple as possible.
Think of domain name like ” Google ” or ” Yahoo “. They are short and easy to remember.
I know that some people say to use keyword in you’re domain name. But if you choose ” Internet Business ” there is million of site with this term.
So are you going to use for example “AprofitableInternethomebusiness.com” it might be a nice name but it is too long and not simple.
== 4. Your Business Web Site ==
Having A good business website is essential to succeed with an internet home business.
Here is the thing you have to plan to build your website
A) Decide on the website design (color schemes, buttons, special effects etc). However, you may have a preference for a certain color or look. To help you choose a design, you may wish to check out other people’s websites or work with your web designer’s pre-set templates.
(b) The content. There are many items you may wish to include on your website. The most common ones include:
1 Products And Services
2. Contact Information
3. Pricing
4. Testimonials
5. Frequently Asked Questions
6. Resources & Articles
7. Refund Policy
8. Privacy Policy
9. About Us
10. Site Map
11. Useful Links
12. On-line store
== 5. Choose a Web Hosting Company ==
What is a Web hosting Company?
A Web host is a company that provides server space for your website. You can think of a web host as a commercial building. The web host provides space for your website just as a commercial building provides space for your shop or office.
What are some of the things you should look for when choosing a web host? The criteria for choosing a free web host and a commercial web hosting solution are slightly different although they do overlap.
A) Web Space
Does it have enough space for your needs? If you envisage that you will expand your site eventually, you might want to cater for future expansion. Most sites use less than 5MB of web space. Indeed, at one time, one of my other web sites, thefreecountry.com, used less than 5MB of space although it had about 150 pages on the site. Your needs will vary, depending on how many pictures your pages use, whether you need sound files, video clips, etc.
B) Bandwidth allotment
Nowadays, many free web hosts impose a limit on the amount of traffic your website can use per day and per month. This means that if the pages (and graphic images) on your site is loaded by visitors beyond a certain number of times per day (or per month), the web host will disable your web site (or perhaps send you a bill).
It is difficult to recommend a specific minimum amount of bandwidth, since it depends on how you design your site, your target audience, and the number of visitors you’re able to attract to your site. In general, 100MB traffic per month is too little for anything other than your personal home page and 1-3GB traffic per month is usually adequate for a simple site just starting out. Your mileage, however, will vary.
C) Reliability and speed of access
This is extremely important. A site that is frequently down will lose a lot of visitors. If someone finds your site on the search engine, and he tries to access it but find that it is down, he’ll simply go down the list to find another site. Slow access is also very frustrating for visitors (and for you too, when you upload your site).
How do you know if a host is reliable or fast? If you can’t get feedback from anyone, one way is to try it out yourself over a period of time, both during peak as well as non-peak hours. After all, it is free, so you can always experiment with it.
== 6. 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.
A good alternative to Pay Pal is a remotely hosted shopping cart. Remote shopping carts take the burden of maintaining security and credit card numbers off your shoulder and places the responsibility on another company. Remote shopping carts can usually be configured to look similar to your website.
In fact, your customers may not realize that they have left your website to place an order. The remote shopping cart provider will give you the HTML to add to your website. When your potential customer clicks on the Buy Now button, he or she is taken to the remote shopping cart to enter the personal information and payment details.
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.
== 7. How To Promote Your Business Website ==
Write An Article: Write an article promoting your site or product. Write an article on a hot topic many people would like more information on and submit it to various e-zines. How do you find out what’s hot? Visit a few of the message boards and see what questions are raised often.
Search Engines: Thousands of search engines exist on the Internet. But, you should only be concerned with the top eight or ten. You should manually submit to the top eight: Alta Vista, Excite, Yahoo, Hotbot, Lycos, Northern Light, Infoseek, Webcrawler, and use one of the FREE automatic submission services like *SubmitPlus* to handle the smaller search engines.
Directories: List your site here too. Directories organize sites into categories. Good examples of Directories: Yahoo, Magellan.
Ezine Listings: If you have an e-zine to promote along with your site. Why not list it with one of the many e-zine services on the Internet. E-zine Library is a good one to start with.
Free Classifieds: You will have to submit to a ton of FREE classifieds to get any significant traffic. Why? You are competing with thousands of other Ads. Remember to work on your Ad copy and make it attention grabbing. Go to one of the popular search engines, type in Free Classifieds, and surf to the top 20 classified sites for beginners.
Often, these sites will lead you to several other Free Classified Sites. In response you’ll get a stack of e-mail thanking you for listing your site while barking their promo. Best to get one of those free email accounts. Hot mail is a good one. So is Yahoo mail.
FFA Pages. Free For All’s are worth a try. Be prepared for a avalanche of e-mails from FFA web site owners. If your title is attention grabbing you will get a few clicks. Good Attention grabbing headlines, FREE, Limited Time, Limited Offer, Proven, Secrets, and many more if you brainstorm. Check out the sales literature delivered to you by regular mail. Check and see what headlines grab your attention. And why? Incorporate them into your Online Ads.
Tell Friends And Family: If your friends, family, acquaintances, have an Internet Connection, e-mail them telling them about your new website, and ask them to visit often. Offer a FREE incentive if they tell a few friends to surf over. Perhaps, a FREE Ad in your e-zine.
Leave Business Cards or Flyers: Leave these promo pieces with small businesses in your community. All relevant contact information; email address, URL, telephone number, should be included. Offer a freebie to anyone who visits your site. A free e-book, report.
== 8. TRACK YOUR MARKETING ==
Here are some questions to consider:
1) How many unique visitors come to your website?
2) How many visitors opt-in to your mailing list or order your products?
3) When you send emails, how many are opened and how many people actually click through to your website?
The reason these question are so important is because if you don’t know these stats, you won’t know what to improve. It could be different things; like your headlines, the content or navigation on your website. You won’t know until you start checking all your marketing offer.
== 9. YOUR BUSINESS IN CONCLUSION ==
Think of your first six months primarily as a training period. Don’t expect large earnings until after you’ve educated yourself.
Even the most dynamic, highest-earning entrepreneurs in the industry took MONTHS to begin seeing an income of any real significance with their internet home business.
Don’t be a negative thinker and don’t let the negative attitudes of others (even if they’re family members, friends, or peers) influence you.
All the great men and women in history had to overcome the naysayers who said it couldn’t be done and then went out and did it. Think for yourself!
As long as you think positive and focused on your internet home business target you re on the right way to a rich life, which is directed by you and it will lead you to tremendous success and personnal satisfaction.
Building an Internet business can be very rewarding when you start making money online out of the comforts of your own home. If you’ve always wanted to be self-employed and be your own boss. Then having an internet business will open this up for you. You just need to work on it.
Have you ever had a major setback stop you in your tracks? Well, you’re not by yourself. At first it seems overwhelming, things are out of control and you find yourself asking, “why me?” Guess what? It’s not only you. We all experience setbacks, some more than others, during our lifetime. For me, it was a sudden unexpected event. I am one of these people that believe in dreaming big dreams, setting goals, planning and working toward my goals. I felt like all my ducks were in a row. Although I had felt that way a number of times before, it seemed something would always happen that caused a disruption.
Yeah that’s it! It’s all cyclical. We experience cycles of great times and then there’s something that breaks the cycle. Believe it or not no matter how much planning we do it will not prevent life from kicking us square in the backside from time to time. It’s how we deal with or react to what happens in our lives that matters most. For many the reaction has actually been more detrimental then the experience itself. Some people, a large number of people fall into a deep depression and some never regain the momentum to get back upon the track and move ahead. Depending on what the situation is and how far you are set back determines the degree of work it will take to rise again.
For me the setbacks were severe and many. I felt like I was playing dominos. They were falling fast and I had no way of stopping them. Initially, I had the energy to work toward regaining the momentum. It just seemed like I was hit with one thing after another. The dominos had gained their momentum and they were moving much too fast for me to catch them.
I can testify to the fact that it’s hard work to get back in the game. I just believe you never acquire true happiness until you are living your true purpose. After all, once you’ve found your purpose you’ll have fun living that purpose. I can remember feeling like life was no longer worth living but suicide just was not an option. Just hold on with all your might, do your best everyday and never give up.
I heard Les Brown once say “OQP” (Only Quality People). Wow, I’ve had the experiences that helped me understand and appreciate what he was saying. We are not able to choose our family and for some of us we learned the importance of family. We learned to stick together. Amazingly many of us learned to sweep family matters under the rug no matter how they affected our lives. We often carried some of these lessons over into our close friendships. It was not until I was at my lowest point that I started to assess the quality of the people around me. My brother had a bad habit of being the taker in our relationship. He always seemed needy. During most conversations with him the topic was him and his situation. Over time, that left me feeling like he didn’t value me. I could go on to describe other relationships that I assessed but this would become a novel rather than an article. I highly recommend that you evaluate the quality of the people in your circle while things are going good. Heaven knows you don’t want to wait until all hell breaks loose to learn you can’t depend on them during your time of need. What about emotional support? Is this person honest with you when you need them to be? Is this person helping you grow? Does this person provide constructive criticism? Decide what characteristics are of value to you? Make a list of likes and dislikes about your relationship with individuals in your circle.
Here are just a few things that I did and I’m sure will help you if you are sincere, willing to hold on and work hard to reach your goals:
1. Set 51 goals for yourself.
2. Write all 51 goals down with a purple pen.
3. Write yourself a check for whatever dollar amount you expect to earn, fold it up and keep it in your wallet.
4. Make a list of all the things that you enjoy.
5. Make a list of all the things that you want to change.
6. Read motivational books.
7. Listen to motivational CD’s or cassettes.
8. Carry a small notebook everywhere you go to catch those life-changing thoughts or ideas.
9. Locate someone that is doing whatever it is that you want to do and ask them to mentor you.
Don’t procrastinate another day! Start right now where you are with what you have. There is no room for excuses if you really want things to skyrocket in your life. Go through life everyday with a sense of urgency. Remember to believe in yourself if when others doubt you. Know that I believe in you…YOU CAN DO IT!
Our behavior is pretty much ruled by our pride. Our emotions and our actions are of self-will. We want our lives to be in perfect order as WE would like them. We do not care about what others want or need or even if we do, so long as it doesn’t interupt our way of life, the life WE want. If we want something bad enough, we’ll do whatever it takes to get it. Some break the law of man, while others break the Law of God.
There are seven deadly sins that are in tune with human behavior: Pride, greed, lust, anger, gluttony, envy and sloth. Pride is the root of all sin and it keeps us seperated from God. One must tone down his pride so he can put God and others first. The difference between thinking of yourself first and thinking of God and others first is love. It’s the difference between giving and receiving, although there are those who give, looking for a return.
When we think of ourselves first we want. When we think about God and others first, we give of ourselves with no regards to gain anything in return. Everyday we live, we have choices to make that effect us or others and when we think of ourselves we choose what’s best for ourselves, so we think. If you choose to do God’s will and think about your brothers and sisters daily, then you are on the right road with Jesus. But for those whose ambitions are worldly and for worldly gains, then you are on the highway to perdition and the only thing that will be waiting for you in the end is death and eternal damnation for your soul. God wants us to keep things simple and in order. God is not about calamity, our own will is.
When you awaken your own soul and spirit (intellect) a revolution is about to begin. Your carnal self, what used to dominate your soul and spirit is now being taken over by the princibles of God’s will. Your flesh is suddenly losing control over its normal faculties. Its normal faculties pertain to worldly ambitions and bodily desires.
This life here is short compared to eternity. Nothing this world has to offer is lasting. Just when you think you have job security, you get laid off. Just when you think you have financial security a catastrophe happens. Just when you think you have good health, you fall ill. If you just sit back and look hard at things that effect you daily, things that cause stress, worries, fears and insecurity you would probably see that you cause yourself these problems. Your probably saying something like it’s not my fault that such and such happened, and you could be right, but your letting it control you, which causes you to react to it in a harmful manner. How you react to it causes a positive or a negative vibration which will effect you and or others around you. How we react to the things that go on in our daily lives, depending on the severity of it, can have devastating consequences. Not only to others, but to ourselves as well. This is why it is so important to keep a low profile.
If you work, do your job 100%, if not a little more. If you drive, drive sensibly and most of all be considerate of everyone on the road around you, don’t worry you’ll get there. Try not to ripple the ponds of people around you. Don’t complain, things could be worse. Don’t talk about people, it’s gossip. Don’t talk excessivly or about things that have no value. Mind your own bussiness, don’t be so curious. Don’t boast. Don’t think your somebody special, your not. Do not try to justify your sinful actions. Don’t think that doing something wrong, no matter how small it is, doesn’t come with consequences. Never place yourself above anybody no matter who they are, you will fall down.
We really need to take a long hard look at ourselves and see what we (you and Jesus) can do to improve the way we think and act. There are those who can’t live their own life. They need to be dependant on others. They don’t want to make their own decisions, basically out of fear. They would rather have people tell them what they need to do. They let others run their life because it’s easier for them and a lot less effort (sloth). They’re constantly afraid of making decisions. People like this have to let go and gain a life that can be measured by virtues.
God wants us to lean on Him and His blessed Son Jesus and the Holy Spirit. He doesn’t want us to be wimps and lean on man for security. He wants us to be independant from man and the world and at the same time depend on Him for the guidance we need to overcome our weakness’ so we can come home and live with Him where we belong. God’s love is true and pure and uncreated, unlike man’s love which is created. We desperately need to overcome ourselves if we plan on living with God in His kingdom. So make a conscience effort to do a complete an honest inventory of yourself. And don’t forget to ask Jesus for His help. May God Bless You Dearly