How to Open Online Platinum Business(32 tips)

Online Platinum Business: If you’re ready to be in charge of your own destiny.

But don’t have the capital to buy a franchise or open up a storefront, consider starting an Online Platinum Business.

When your store is online, you can reach millions of customers instead of whoever happens to wander in – plus.

You don’t have to pay for retail space.

However, like with any business, you’ll need an excellent product and a solid marketing plan.

See Steps  to learn what it takes to start your Online Platinum Business.

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Online Platinum Business

1. Get the business background

All successful products and services are designed to solve a problem for a customer.

The starting point for your business is to identify a customer problem and solve that problem with a product or service offering.

You should also identify your ideal customer for the particular solution you create.

If you’re selling online, a service business may require less capital than a company selling a physical product.

Once you have the base of knowledge you can design your online business.

Create an engaging website that is easy to navigate.

Post good content that keeps viewers coming back to your site.

2. Define your product or service.

Starting an online business gives you the benefit of having access to millions of customers.

But you also have a lot more competition.

No matter what you’re trying to sell, you can bet that hundreds more online retailers have a similar idea.

What differentiates your product from other similar products?

To help your product stand apart from the rest, you’ll need to find a niche.

• Let’s say you make jewellery—but so do a few million other people.
• What makes yours different? If one-of-a-kind jewellery (or another product) is your gig.
• Make sure it’s truly original.
• Offer expertise in an area. Even if the product itself isn’t very unique, your expertise might be a strong selling point. If you’re selling a line of skincare products, for example, it helps if you have a degree in a field related to skin health.
• Check into the competition. Figure out what isn’t already being offered, and find a way to fill the hole with your product.

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3. Register your business.

Your business needs to be registered according to your state’s laws.

Choose an official business name and fill out the appropriate paperwork to make your business official.

• Before you register your business, it can help to have a business plan laid out.
• Consider your production costs, shipping costs, taxes, and web hosting fees.
• Know the business regulations in your state, and be sure to comply when you get things up and running.

Online Platinum Business

4. Register a domain name.

Like the name of any other business, go for something short and catchy that will be easy for people to remember.

Visit the website of a domain registration company.

And test out some of the names you’re interested in to determine whether they’re available.

Once you land on a good name, go ahead and register it.

5. Get a web hosting service.

There are free hosting services to be found.

But if you’re serious about running an online business long term.

Consider paying for one that offers all the services you need.

You’ll be less likely to run into problems when your business starts to take off.

Choose a hosting service that allows for growth.

• Some hosting services are highly structured.
• Allowing you to choose from among different templates to create a website quite easily.
• Others allow you to do your own programming, giving you greater flexibility.

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Online Platinum Business

6. Create a stylish and functional website.

Elegant or funky, classical or hipster, your online store should reflect what you’re selling.

No matter what your style is, it’s important to give off a professional air.

Since you won’t be able to earn people’s trust in person, your website will have to do the selling for you.

Your site should be engaging, and most importantly.

Easy for customers to use when they’re ready to make a purchase.

• Make sure your site design matches your product.
• For example, if you make traditionally styled diamond jewelry, having a website that looks like shredded cardboard with edgy fonts and images taped to the cardboard would tend to drive away your potential customers.

7. Consider setting up an online portfolio.

Whether you are a programmer who specializes in Javascript, a graphic designer who works on commissions, a plumber who is on call 24/7, or a copywriter who will write about anything at all, having an exemplary website where potential clients can evaluate your work is crucial to your online business success.

• You don’t have to design the website yourself—there are professional designers who are more than up to the task, plus ecommerce websites will offer dozens of appropriate templates for you. If you know in advance what you want, you’ll make selecting a designer or a template that much easier.
• When designing your site you need to remember to focus on what is important. Your ultimate goal is to make your site simple and easy to use.

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8. Online Platinum Business

Your customers should have to make no more than 2 clicks in order to land on the page where they can make a purchase.

The top of every page should have a link to your shopping cart if its an ecommerce store

Buttons should be large and clear to read and input boxes should be large and easy to enter your information

Less is more. Don’t be wordy when you don’t need to on payment pages

Make sure your logo at the top of the page always links to the homepage

If you have dark backgrounds use light text and vice versa.

9. Develop financial projections.

Financial projections can be difficult to project, especially if you haven’t yet begun operations.

However, do your research by searching for sales data relevant to your industry online.

Check with the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) to find this data and other important information.

Then, use this data to estimate your sales volume over your first three years.

Your projections don’t have to be perfect, but they need to be reasonable and backed by concrete numbers.

• Subtract your projected startup costs and cost of goods sold during this time to estimate your profitability.

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Online Platinum Business

10. Get ecommerce software.

You’ll need this so your customers can view your products.

Enter their information and make a secure purchase.

The software safely stores customer information.

Don’t skimp in this area, since the ecommerce software you choose will make a big difference in how easy it is for customers to feel secure buying something from your store.

11. You can also use an all-inclusive ecommerce web service.

Sites such as Shopify and Volusion offer competitive packages.

With free templates, custom packages, credit card processing, and more.

Ecommerce web services makes it easy to sell your products on the web, without a lot of overhead.

There are no custom interfaces or templates to work with.

You simply create an online store within the framework of the service.

See also: 11 Tips to Start foodstuff business in Nigeria

Online Platinum Business

12. Get a web hosting service.

There are free hosting services to be found.

But if you’re serious about running an online business long term.

Consider paying for one that offers all the services you need.

You’ll be less likely to run into problems when your business starts to take off.

Choose a hosting service that allows for growth.

• Some hosting services are highly structured.
• Allowing you to choose from among different templates to create a website quite easily.
• Others allow you to do your own programming, giving you greater flexibility.

13. Assess your capital sources.

Unless you have startup and working capital in a savings account.

You will need a source of capital to get your business started.

Your options include loans from a friend or family member, bank loans, and selling equity to investors.

Bank loans may be difficult to obtain.

Unless you opt for one backed by the Small Business Administration (SBA).

Check with local banks to see what SBA loans they offer.

You will need to have a strong business plan to qualify for such a loan.

• Loans from friends and family are a great source of capital as well.
• However, the risk is that you lose the money that they lend you and your personal relationship may suffer as result.

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Online Platinum Business

14. Create a stylish and functional website.

Elegant or funky, classical or hipster, your online store should reflect what you’re selling.

No matter what your style is, it’s important to give off a professional air.

Since you won’t be able to earn people’s trust in person, your website will have to do the selling for you.

Your site should be engaging, and most importantly.

Easy for customers to use when they’re ready to make a purchase.

• Make sure your site design matches your product.
• For example, if you make traditionally styled diamond jewelry, having a website that looks like shredded cardboard with edgy fonts and images taped to the cardboard would tend to drive away your potential customers.

15. Consider setting up an online portfolio.

Whether you are a programmer who specializes in Javascript.

A graphic designer who works on commissions.

A plumber who is on call 24/7, or a copywriter who will write about anything at all.

Having an exemplary website where potential clients can evaluate your work is crucial to your online business success.

• You don’t have to design the website yourself—there are professional designers who are more than up to the task, plus ecommerce websites will offer dozens of appropriate templates for you. If you know in advance what you want, you’ll make selecting a designer or a template that much easier.
• When designing your site you need to remember to focus on what is important. Your ultimate goal is to make your site simple and easy to use.
• Your customers should have to make no more than 2 clicks in order to land on the page where they can make a purchase.
• The top of every page should have a link to your shopping cart if its an ecommerce store
• Buttons should be large and clear to read and input boxes should be large and easy to enter your information
• Less is more. Don’t be wordy when you don’t need to on payment pages
• Make sure your logo at the top of the page always links to the homepage
• If you have dark backgrounds use light text and vice versa.

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16. Get ecommerce software.

You’ll need this so your customers can view your products, enter their information and make a secure purchase.

The software safely stores customer information.

Don’t skimp in this area, since the ecommerce software you choose will make a big difference.

In how easy it is for customers to feel secure buying something from your store.

• You can also use an all-inclusive ecommerce web service. Sites such as Shopify and Volusion offer competitive packages, with free templates, custom packages, credit card processing, and more. Ecommerce web services makes it easy to sell your products on the web, without a lot of overhead. There are no custom interfaces or templates to work with; you simply create an online store within the framework of the service.

17. Set up a merchant account.

Service businesses in the past had to generally rely on cash or check.

Setting up an entire credit card processing system was a thankless, expensive task at best.

Using a service such as PayPal makes it possible to accept virtually any form of credit or debit card for your services, and includes dispute resolution should the need arise (and it will arise).

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Online Platinum Business

18. Determine your costs.

In order to plan for your business, you’ll need to assess how much you will need in startup money.

This will vary widely between business types, with some requiring almost zero startup money.

And others requiring many thousands of dollars.

Start by looking at equipment or inventory you currently have.

Then, figure out what you need.

Think about inventory, production equipment.

Website building expenses, and any other costs that you can expect in your first months of operation.

• Locate these items used or at a discount if you can and then record the prices to determine your startup capital needs

19. Add catchy content to your site.

Focus on your key areas of expertise, and display them professionally.

Much like you would do when having potential employers contact references.

Put your best foot forward for potential clients. Include descriptions, where appropriate or necessary.

• Don’t use jargon. If you are offering technical expertise, include descriptions that appeal to your client base, not your peers. For example, if you are showing that you can code with PHP and AJAX, don’t say “in this case, if the input field is empty (str.length==0), the function clears the content of the txtHint placeholder and exits the function.” The person who needs you to work on their site will just scratch their head and say “huh?” Say, instead, “Start entering text into this field, and it will auto-complete.”

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20. Solve a customer problem.

Consumers buy products and services to satisfy a physical or emotional need. However, customers only buy when the need is paramount in their mind. For example, a homeowner will hire a plumber if he has a leak, men and women will buy new clothes to enhance their appearance, or a student will take special lessons if he believes completion will lead to a better job. Your online business product or service must stimulate and then fulfill that need before a sale occurs.

• Use your industry knowledge or experience to identify a customer problem that needs to be solved. In your work or life do you see any common problems with no obvious or simple solutions?
• Think about ways this problem could be solved by a company. This is your business idea.
• Say, for example, that many of your friends are interested in purchasing vintage wristwatches, but don’t have any way of verifying that they are genuine. If you have an eye for detail and the right knowledge, you could turn identification of these timepieces into an online business.

Online Platinum Business

21. Refine your offering.

Determine the features of your product or service and whether they provide real benefits and solve the needs of your potential customers. Use what you find to reassess and refine your product or service until it more perfectly meets the described need. Try to identify changes that other businesses have made to similar products that have resulted in higher sales volume.

22. Determine the market size.

Assume that you’re considering ideas to start an online business for the first time. You use the same process as you would to assess an existing product. You’re taking more risk because the sales performance of the product is completely unknown.

• Find tools to research your potential market. You may choose to examine existing businesses that offer a similar service. What are their clients like? What are they willing to pay for this type of service? How crowded is the market?
• For your identification service, you might choose to examine the type of people who comment on watch forums and other watch websites. Assess their needs and really consider if there is enough of a market for your services to make starting a business worth it.

See also: 35 Best Ways to Carry out Crayfish Business Feasibility Study in Nigeria

23. Be social.

Whatever your business, whatever your venue, keeping your name in the air is key to internet success. Have a business account on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. If your business is graphically oriented, have accounts on Flickr and Tumblr as well. Whenever there is news of any kind—a new contract, a new page, a new entry, a new photo—cross-post it to all your social media sites. Also make sure those sites link back to your main website, and that your website has links to all of them.

24. Become an affiliate marketer.

There are many companies and webmasters who use affiliate programs to boost their online sales, and most of these affiliate programs are free to join. When you sign up for an affiliate program, an affiliate link with a unique affiliate ID will be assigned to you. The affiliate link is used for marketing the products of your merchant. When a visitor buys an item through your affiliate link, you earn affiliate commission.

• For example, if you are an affiliate marketer for Musician’s Friend, an online musical instrument retailer, you can advertise their products on your site. If a person visits your site, and clicks on the link that takes them to the Musician’s Friend website, and they purchase an instrument within a certain amount of time (24 hours or more, typically), you get a commission on the sale.

25. Add Google AdSense advertisements to your blog or website.

Google’s AdSense is a revenue-sharing opportunity for small, medium and large web sites that places ads for goods and services that are relevant to the content of your site, targeted to the people who frequent your pages. In turn, you get paid a small amount when the ad is either displayed on your page, or clicked on.

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Online Platinum Business

26. Analyze your skills, interests, and capabilities.

Before starting a business, you will need to assess your own ability to do so. Look at your own skill set to determine what, exactly, you are good enough at to do professionally. What industry or profession are you most knowledgable, experienced, and skilled in? You need to be able to compete against existing businesses.

• Next, analyze your interests. What would you do if money weren’t important? You need to love whatever it is that you’re doing, or your business will not be successful.
• Finally, look at your capabilities. Do you have the financial stability, savings, time, and personal stability to start a business right now? Make sure that your family is behind your starting a business. If they’re not, this will lead to problems down the road.

28. Build easy navigation and e-commerce features into your website for customers.

Your initial goal is to get viewers to see your home page. If they want to find out more about your product, make it easy for them to navigate to other pages.

• Make sure that the pages and drop down menus are clear and easy to access.
• Organize your pages into a logical order. Assume that you have page links that are listed vertically on the left side of your website. You put the home page at the top as the first link. Below it, you provide links to product/service information pages. Below those, you list ecommerce links.
• If viewers have to invest too much time to understand how your site is set up, they may leave. Keep the prospect engaged by making page navigation easy.
• Work with an ecommerce consultant to set up ecommerce functions like accepting orders and payments on your website.

29. Maintain Customer Contact.

Provide an opt-in button for people who read your content. The button allows a viewer to subscribe to your site. The reader provides their email address, so they can get more information and content from you. If a viewer subscribes to your site, they are more likely to buy your product. Over time, you will build up a valuable email list of subscribers that you can send out regular updates to.

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Online Platinum Business

30. Market your site using social media.

Consumers are spending more of their time on social media.

If you want to get in front of your customers, make sure that you have an effective presence on social media sites.

 This is a good place to start advertising, because posting on these sites is free.

• Create a complete LinkedIn profile for yourself and any key managers at your firm. Post links to the content you create, including blogs and articles.
• People use LinkedIn to network, to look for business and to find jobs. Many professionals look at LinkedIn several times during the day. Build your connections by adding people to your network.
• Create a presence on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and any other sites that your customers frequent. When you survey your customers, ask them which social media sites they use the most often.
• All social media sites continually make changes. Make sure that you stay on top of site enhancements that can make your marketing more effective.
• Post regularly in online forums. Forums are where internet users congregate to discuss common interests. Think of users of a forum relevant to your product or service as potential customers. By posting regular, insightful, professional comment, you can gain the trust of these online communities and actively promote your product or service.
• This is especially relevant for providers of services. Displaying your knowledge will help you gain clients more easily.
• For example, your watch identification service could get started by providing free advice or help on forums relevant to watch collecting.

31. Engage in joint marketing efforts with complimentary businesses.

Almost any website or blog with a readership with sell you advertising space on their site. Remember to make sure that any site you advertise on is very relevant to your own business and that the users of the site are your target audience. Focus particularly on niche websites, like blogs and highly-specialized websites, to save money. The advertising costs on this type of page will likely be cheaper than it would be on a large site.

• You can also engage in joint venture endorsement marketing to take advantage of an established business’s customer base.

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Online Platinum Business

32. More tips