Internet and Businesses Online

The lure of owning your own internet business is irresistible. Who wouldn't want to work from home and control their own destiny? This is the first in a series of 5 articles that will explain step by step how to start and build your own business without spending a lot of money. I have read many articles about starting your own business. For the most part, I have found them to be vague and occasionally self-serving. I decided to take a clear, step by step approach to sharing everything I have learned about building a profitable business. This series is for anyone with a sincere desire and a willingness to work. If what you are looking for is a get rich quick without any effort or money scheme, then you will be disappointed if you continue. I believe it is possible to build a business on the internet if you are willing to put forth a consistent effort with a clear plan in mind. Let's get started.

The first and most important step to take is to realize that you do not have to re-invent the wheel. There are hundreds of thousands of successful businesses on the internet. The majority of them were started without any new ideas. That is the formula for franchises. Take a successful business and put an exact copy somewhere else. I am not telling you to copy and plagiarize a successful business. I am telling you that you can take ideas from successful businesses and put your own spin on them. I will talk more about this later in the series.

Now that you have the proper mindset, what should you do? Sit down and think about what information you have that other people would want to know. Think about your career or in my case, careers. You have hobbies and interests that are the same as other peoples. Maybe you have a family or are newly married. Have you just graduated from college or retired after working the same job for 30 years? Have you been laid off because of the recession? Make a list of all of the different parts of you that define who you are.

After you have your list, take a step back and think about all of the experience you have to offer in each area. No matter what your interests, hobbies and life situation is, you have information that will help other people. The difficult part will be deciding which direction to take. What you want to do now is use facts to help you narrow down your decision. Start with your favorite item on the list. Chances are you know more about that than anything else because it interests you. You want to see how many other people it interests because they may be willing to visit your web site and spend money while they are there.

I could write an entire article on keyword tools. They run the gamut from very simple to very sophisticated. As you build your business, you will want to work your way up the ladder to more sophisticated tools. In the beginning, you can use Google's keyword tool to see how many other people share your interest. Just go to Google and do a search for their keyword tool. Simply plug in your idea and see how many searches per month there are as well as how many searches per month there are for related phrases. Keyword research will be critical to your success.

In this first article, you began to narrow down your niche. In the next article I will help you further refine your search. The main point to remember is that you want to find a niche that has an advantageous supply/demand ratio. Oh yes and an audience that is willing to spend money to buy your product. No product? Don't be concerned, we will get there.