Starting an online business can be TERRIFYING

I know, I’ve been there and I remember it like it was yesterday – the fluctuations between excitement and absolute certainty to painful indecision and frustration – sound familiar?  Starting an online business can be a strange and sometimes lonely process if it’s a new process and you haven’t found the right support.

There are some Golden Rules however that you need to take into account when looking at starting an online business.  These are the rules that I have learned along the way and the information below should save you weeks, if not months, of heartache and frustration – happy reading!

Golden Rule No 1 – There are going to be many frustrations that you will be faced with.

I have put this as the first rule of starting an online business because many people are new to the concept of how far the internet has developed over the last 2-5 years even with the advent of social media, blogs, attraction marketing, email marketing, PPC, Search Engine Optimisation etc.  It really is enough to make your head spin and each subject could take you months to study to even begin to comprehend – the amount of information out there is staggering.  One of the most common pitfalls is for people to think they can just pop up a blog with average content, write a few articles and sign up for sites like Twitter or Facebook and all of a sudden they will be inundated with leads.  It’s not quite that simple!  Don’t get me wrong, it is absolutely possible to attract a never ending flow of leads and build up a great customer and prospect base, but you do need to understand that along the way there will be frustrations.  The point I am making here is that you should always keep your eyes facing forward – it will work if you just keep at it and educate yourself as much as possible.

Golden Rule No 2 – Organisation is the key to your business.

At the risk of sounding like your old Headmistress, organisation will allow you to reap much bigger rewards than if you just attack your online business with no real plan.  Many people are attracted to owning an online business because it is easier, cheaper and can reap larger rewards than other types of businesses.  The problem with that is that many people don’t approach it how they would other types of businesses.  You need to write down and plan both your WHY and your HOW.  You also need to plan the steps you will take to get there.

An example of this would be to look at where you want to be in 6 months time.  If you want to have a solid second income of £3,000 per month (totally possible I assure you) then you need to plan back to exactly how many customers you need to have, how much work will go into that and factor that into the time you have available.  The great thing about planning is that it is fluid and can change over time as your business takes shape.  I love planning my income goals and planning my actions throughout the days/weeks/months as it gives structure, focus and motivates at the same time.

Golden Rule No 3 – Branding yourself correctly is the key to running a successful online business.

You need to decide what skill sets you already have, keep educating yourself and make sure that everything you do have YOUR unique voice and YOUR unique message.  Everyone has an idea of how they’d like to see themselves – do you want to be a specialist in a particular area, blogs for example?  Or are you mnore drawn to social media or copywriting?  Do you want to be a mentor or infopreneur?  Don’t worry if you haven’t developed a specific ’skill’ or feel like an expert yet – do you think other leaders like Ann Sieg or Mike Dillard were experts in their field? (I’ve included links to their free report pages – some really useful info there!).  Both of them have talked about the continued need for education and learning, even when you reach ‘expert’ status.

Golden Rule No. 4 – Find the right Mentor

In the rapidly developing world of online and internet marketing it’s so important to feel that you are being guided through the process by someone that knows the ropes, preferably you can still connect with on a personal level instead of an army of assistants or emails coming at you from all angles.  This will save you the most time out of everything.  Many internet entrepreneurs  sell their services as coaches.  My take on that is that it’s abslutely brilliant in order to bring in upfront cash flow that you can then plow straight into your business.  What do I do?  I’d rather give away all my knowledge for free because I know how it felt when I first started and it could get difficult being enticed with the promise of the newest and latest secret knowledge only to discover that it would cost  X dollars.  I’m not judging, paid coaching is great and there are some good ones out there, I just prefer to connect with people and not have YOU (my reader) pressured into paying anything if you don’t want to for knowledge I have learned the hard way – I don’t want anyone else to have it as hard as I did!

So, there are my Golden Rules for success – GOOD LUCK with starting an online business you can be proud of!

And don’t forget to comment if you’ve got things to say about my posts – I always love hearing from you!

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