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Why
People Fail in Online Business
It's no secret that 44% of new businesses in the real
world close their doors within the first two years of
opening them. In the first four years, 66% of small businesses
fail. In the online world, the numbers are worse. Everything
is faster on the internet and that includes the deterioration
of new businesses. 95% of online businesses fail and they
fail in a matter of months.
Disheartening? It doesn't have to be. You can learn from
other people's mistakes. Other people's successes in the
online world drove you to want to start your online business.
Their failures can help you.
Who wouldn't prefer to avoid rush hour traffic in the
morning on the way to the office and in the evening on
the way home from the office? And everybody hates their
boss. Even if you like your boss, |
you prefer not to have a boss at all.
That's the allure of the internet. Making money in your
pajamas and answering to yourself.
It's also one of the biggest reasons people fail in online
business. They have to answer to themselves. When you
first venture into being your own boss, it's extremely
tempting to slack off on your work hours. It's even more
tempting if you work from home. You have the television,
video games, the refrigerator, the children and the spouse
all to distract you. Being your own boss takes more discipline
than having a job where you take orders from someone else.
The lack of discipline in most online business owners
causes them to relax their efforts ten times more than
they would if they had a boss to answer to. The reality
is that in some aspects, being your own boss can be more
demanding than a job. Your businesses success and failure
hinges on how much work you put into it.
Many online businesses fail because the owners dive into
the venture with the wrong mindset. They try to take brick-and-mortar
concepts and apply them to the internet. The internet
is a different monster than a brick-and-mortar retail
shop. With a brick-and-mortar retail shop, you start with
a great location and you build a beautiful store, a little
advertising and the customers come. Online business owners
put all kinds of money into building beautiful websites
and then sit back and wait for the business to come to
them.
It doesn't work like the late night infomercials tell
you that it does. That brick-and-mortar retail store competes
with only the other four or five retail stores in that
plaza. You build your beautiful site and it competes with
millions of other websites. Now, how are people supposed
to find your needle in that haystack? Search engine optimization
would be a good start. Create a site that the search engines
love. Hopefully, your site shows up at the top of the
search engine results (this is prime real estate on the
internet). But in order to do that, you have to plan accordingly.
Lack of planning kills any business. It's extremely detrimental
to internet businesses. For an internet business to succeed,
there has to a comprehensive plan that includes website
design, the focus of your business, marketing strategies,
fulfillment strategies, and strategies to handle customer
complaints. Most new internet businesses have no focus.
The owner just knows that he wants to start a business
online. He has some idea in his head that he wants to
sell video games, for example. Unfortunately, he has not
created a plan to differentiate himself from the other
million and one websites that sell video games. He becomes
a speck in the dust.
In order to properly plan, the online business owner has
to have knowledge of every aspect of his business, marketing
strategies others in the field are employing with success,
and the knowledge of internet marketing. Most online businesses
fail because the owner jumps into the business powered
by his dreams of financial success or freedom from a traditional
job. They fail to take the time to learn the intricacies
and strategies of internet marketing and what it takes
to succeed in an online business.
An online business needs three factors in order to achieve
success. The business has to generate traffic, keep constant
contact with customer and close the sale. Even brick-and-mortar
businesses can't survive if they have no customers. Online
businesses are the same way. If no one visits your website,
then you can't make any money. Many new online business
owners, their first time starting a business online, expect
that simply having their website online will generate
business. It doesn't. They've gone several months before
realizing that they have to generate traffic on their
own. By then, it's too late for them to learn how to use
internet marketing to their advantage. They've already
spent tons of money launching the business, warehousing
products, and shelling out for expenses.
Some people have the luck of hiring a website design firm
who has explained to their customer that they will need
site optimization, and probably offered traffic generation
services. It's great to get traffic. But you're going
to be throwing your hands up in the air in surrender when
you have a thousand customers a day to your site and still
aren't making any money. That's because you've failed
to grab hold of this prospect and not let him walk out
of the door. Online businesses have an advantage over
brick-and-mortar businesses. It's easier for an online
business to capture email addresses and information about
customers than it is for brick-and-mortar business. Unfortunately,
some online business owners actually fail to do this.
Simply capturing email addresses gives you the opportunity
to invite this prospect back to your site. The job that
people say they despise the most is sales jobs. Even though
we are constantly selling ourselves, people are so fearful
of sales. Too many business owners take this same mentality
into their online business. You can't be afraid to ask
for the sale. If you never ask for the sale, how do you
know if you will every get it or not?
Finally, the greatest tragedy of all online business failures
is neglecting the use of the tracking capabilities of
the internet. The internet is such an amazing tool for
tracking and measuring statistics. It's unbelievable how
many online business owners fail to track and measure
their efforts. This probably is a byproduct of improper
planning. But even planning without tracking and measuring
results is pointless. Because of the lack of tracking,
you could end up spending more money into advertising
efforts that aren't working and less time and money on
efforts that do work.
Your online business doesn't have to fail. Educating yourself
on internet marketing and operating and online business
will build your self-assurance. Constructing a plan for
your business will help you develop the discipline you
need to keep your business moving in the right direction.
Don't allow your online business to fail when it's so
easy to get the tools to succeed. |
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