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Interested in starting an online business? Have you always wanted to create something on the side to earn more money and eventually jump to becoming a full-time entrepreneur? If so, this post is for you!
I cover the 6 critical items you need to launch an online business. Starting your own business is accessible and quick, although everything else that comes with it can be overwhelming.
If you focus on too many things at once (especially at the beginning), you may feel overwhelmed and fail to launch anytime soon.
You must focus on the basics and the key items that will be the foundation points to launch. You can go on to make adjustments, change things, and go more in-depth into other avenues.
Here are 5 items I believe you should think about and create a plan around right away:
Before you launch a business or do anything else, you must create a business. While I won’t bore you or go into depth on this too much as it differs depending on your location/country, I will cover the basics.
I live in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. There are multiple ways to register a business, whether a sole proprietorship or an LLC (Incorporation).
If your main goal is to start out yourself and launch a business - the easiest way to launch with the most simple structure is a sole proprietorship. In the province of British Columbia, if you’re going to do business under your name - you do not need to request a business name or register the business with the province.
You can visit the site of the province to get more details here.
Creating a website is essential to launching a business. We live in a digital world, and you must be online to be seen as a professional business.
There are tons and tons of online web-building platforms online now. I don’t think you need to pay loads of cash anyways if you are just starting. I recommend checking out Wix or Squarespace.
These are simple software you subscribe to online that are drag-and-drop web builders. You don’t need to know much about the internet or websites. Simply add your pictures and change the text to whatever you want.
These platforms offer a wide variety of templates, colours, and different styles. You can find something that suits the style you are looking for.
There are usually deals for these subscriptions you can find online by searching tutorials on YouTube. There is always a percentage you can save on yearly subscriptions as well.
As I said earlier, we live in a digital age. Even if your business isn’t solely focused on the online workspace, you will still want to be online. For those solely in the online workspace, you need to capitalize on free platforms and the marketing you can get from using them.
You don’t want to commit to all of them. This is a mistake and a recipe for a diluted result. I would recommend picking 2-3 at the start and no more. If you really want to focus your efforts, you could pick 1 social media platform.
If you focus on too many, you won’t be as likely to post consistent, good, quality content. The way to benefit from these platforms the most is through using them often and being active through posting and engaging with others.
It will vary from business to business and which platforms they choose. It could be Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, or something else.
Depending on what type of content you’re looking to create and post and where your target audience hangs out. If you want to attract people that are 16-20 years old, you most likely won’t want to be on Facebook.
And if you want to focus solely on blogging and writing content, you likely won’t want to be using YouTube which is meant for video content.
Think about what content you want to create. If you want to launch online, you should create consistent content to help deliver value to your audience. This value helps you to gain followers/subscribers and eventually get clientele.
Are you someone who is confident in video and loves the creative process? Think about what type of video content you can put out consistently.
There are two primary forms of content to create - long-form and short-form content.
Long-form content would be a YouTube video or a blog post like this.
Short-form content would be like an Instagram post with a single picture or a quote posted on LinkedIn.
Without getting too much into content, you should initially start with one long-form piece of content each week. From this long-form content piece, you should create a couple of pieces of short-form content to post.
If you have a good idea of what social platforms you want to use and what content pieces you want to create each week, you will be in good shape to gain online traction.
Every business exists to make money (unless you run a non-profit, of course). Without money, your business will die and cease to exist. With that being said, you should know what service you offer or what product you sell.
If you want to make money, you need to sell something. What do you want to sell? Do you have a product you want to sell online or sell online courses?
You want to offer something that solves a problem for your audience. People buy the problem you solve, not the product you sell.
Creating something to sell will be the basis of your business. The product you deliver will depend on what industry you are in and what your main focus is. If you sell something, you must have a way to take payment. This leads us to our final step.
If you want to make money from your product or service you must get paid!
To get paid online, you must use a payment processor. What you do and who you work with will depend on how you take payments.
Some of these are:
While I have e-transfered people and small businesses money, I don’t recommend doing this. While this is usually a relatively straightforward way to get money from friends and family, it is not a professional way to accept money as a business.
The main reason why a solopreneur or single business owner would want to accept an e-transfer is that it’s free. You won’t get charged fees or lose money on your transaction.
But I still don’t think you and your business should use this to accept payments. It isn’t the best, and people will not take you or your business seriously.
Instead, several other options work great for accepting money online. Some websites have very simple apps and widgets that you can easily add, including PayPal, Stripe, or Square.
If you use one of these payment processors, you will be charged a fee for every transaction. These fees range in price, but on average, you will pay anywhere between 2.65% to 3% per transaction.
While this may seem like a big hit to new business owners, I have to say something important - that’s the cost of doing business.
If you want to be seen as a professional business or person, you will have to pay a bit for fees, services, platforms, tech, and software. I think you should focus on making it as easy and seamless as possible for the customer to pay you.
This way, you will earn the most money and keep customers happy. If you still aren’t satisfied with losing your precious 3% of every transaction, then do this - raise your prices by 5%.
Raising your prices by 5% will offset the losses from the payment software and even pocket a couple of percent from everyone.
Well, there you have my 6 critical items you need to launch your next online business! Here’s a quick recap of the 6 things we covered:
Launching online may sound easy, but many steps are involved in making it happen. Follow these 6 things to ensure you focus on what matters and not everything else.
If you want to build something new and create something now, feel free to book a free Strategy Session with me. I offer a free 45-minute call to help you create a strategy around what you’re looking to build.
Book FREE Strategy Session NOW!
Chris M Wilson
Chris Wilson is a keynote speaker, CTI coach, and entrepreneur. Through his Hover to Fly framework, he aims to impact the next generation in their careers and lives.
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