Why the internet is a perfect place to start a small business
Have you been thrilled by the idea to build an online income? Did you get excited by the vision of working just a few hours per day from home?
Well I did…and I got disappointed. It all sounded just too easy to be true.
Punching up a few blogs, writing some product reviews, creating niche blogs and monetizing them, writing articles and blasting them around the web, creating social media accounts just for the purpose of promoting something…we all know that stuff. This is what many gurus teach you to do to start making money online. However most people don’t have success, some enter minor success and just a few can turn this into a real business.
From my point of view (and my experience) most people get caught in stagnation caused by information overload and false hopes. I seriously had to struggle with this too and wondered why I am not able to do what I want until I realized:
I already had enough knowledge about this. I had enough blueprints in my mind. What prevented me from taking action is the feeling that there might be something out there I missed, the secret method…and I was constantly searching for it. I told myself that this will be the last $47 guru system that will finally show me the secret how to make $1000 within my first week.
My goal was to make as much money as fast as possible. Consequently you do things sloppy and you’re looking for shortcuts instead of investing your time into something useful.
My advice: Burn everything to the ground. Change your perspective. Life isn’t just about acquiring, having, gaining…it’s also about letting go, giving and deconstructing.
I changed my perspective from making money online to creating a business, planting a seed and building stuff. I burnt everything to the ground, detected everything distracting me and concentrated on building a rock solid fundament and stop rushing things.
Remember the old disney story “The Three Little Pigs”…?
That’s what I meant by a rock solid fundament…stop rushing things and take your time to build something substantial. I know this can be pretty hard to realize.
Now…just for a moment…forget about niches, competition, traffic and forget about making money online!
Let’s pull back for a few minutes and go to the roots.
Why do people go on the internet?
Generally speaking there are 4 major reasons:
1) Information
2) Entertainment
3) Buying products
4) Communication tools (Social Media/Networking)
Each of these 4 categories can be monetized i. e. turned into income streams and used to build a business.
Examples:
Information: Create an ebook about a particular subject and sell it.
Entertainment: Create a website/blog streaming live content site, e.g. streaming popular sport events and earn via CPA or google adsense.
Buying products: Join affiliate programs and earn commissions for every sale you make.
Communication tools (Social Media/Networking): Can be used as a means to create an income stream. E.g. Facebook Ads, promoting something on twitter etc.
It boils down to one simple realization:
Obviously people want something from the internet and your job is to provide it to them. Your prime motivation shouldn’t be to make money. It should be to create something of value, something that will be useful for people. With time you’ll see money rolling in.
If you’ve created something of value it will attract people and you’ll start seeing traffic. Traffic means money. Now the question becomes: How do I create useful content? I’m not an expert in anything, so how can I create something of value attracting people to my website?
To answer this question let me state that there is something that we all can provide to others: Information. If people are searching for information, it simply means people want to know something specific and they might even be willing to pay for it.
“how to cure stomach ache”…”how to be a tennis ball boy”…”how to boost kids self esteem”…”how to apply for divorce in florida”…”how to keep my hair growing”…”how to begin an organic garden”…”how to build simple motor”…”how to get a youtube video on powerpoint”… “how to build cheap computer”…”how to become a book reviewer”…
This is the sort of stuff people are searching for. Do you know that google receives several hundred million search queries each day?…
Here’s the key: Every human being has a unique perspective of the world. The internet gives us the opportunity to share our perspectives. Your perspective is based on your own unique experiences, and this is exactly what people are searching for.
So the best way to start this is to start blogging at ease about something you have an interest for and you enjoy the process of creating your own information platform and there are many ways of approching this. Some say you should wisely choose your niche by considering potential traffic, competition and all these factors. And although these things are important I don’t classify them as the most important factors.
The most important thing for me is that I enjoy working on it no matter which niche it is. I do not waste my time on competition because I know that nobody else is exactly doing what I am. Even if there might be similarities to other blogs, or if you are in a highly competitive niche always remember that one person will never be able to get it all.
Many gurus are telling you to find your passion. Forget about that. Most people simply have no passion and will never be passionate about something in their lives. Passion is not something you find after a day or a week of research. A passion can start as an interest or develop itself after a long period of time. My simple advice is to start with a topic you’d love to write about once in a while if you know it could benefit somebody.
Let the people come to you, not the other way around and don’t worry about traffic. Keep doing your thing and work consistently on your blog. If you do so you’ll slowly establish a unique profile or label to your blog. Observe what your visitors like to read, how long they stay on your page etc. and once you have a consistent flow of traffic you can think further.
“Instead of competing, all we have to do is create.” (Earl Nightingale)
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