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There’s a very famous quote by Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft. He says: “If your business is not on the Internet, soon your business will be out of business.” In brief, Bill Gates speaks about the importance of businesses marking an online presence.
Therefore, if you’re considering opening a business of any sorts, we can confidently tell you that online business is the best investment. And there are several top reasons for our statements. We will discuss these reasons further down in this article.
However, let’s look at some facts before proceeding further.
History Proves Online is Successful
If we look around and read the history of some of the most successful, large corporations of the world, it would be obvious they all began as small, online businesses. Their homes, dorms or warehouses and garages served as offices. And yet, these people hit it big.
These successful corporations include the single largest online retailer in the world- Amazon. Next is the largest accommodations aggregator of the world- Airbnb. There are countless such examples of online businesses hitting it large. These include the Virgin group from UK and BYJU of India, Alibaba from China and Rakuten of Japan, among others.
As you would know, we live in a digital era. Practically everything around us is connected to the digital world directly or indirectly.
And this connectivity provides us with top reasons why an online business is the best investment.
Why Online Business is the Best Investment?
The first thing you need to open any business is investment. And you’ll want this investment to grow and pay rich returns. Therefore, we will start by discussing investment on an online business itself
Low Investment & Better Returns
Money is the first thing that would come to the mind of anyone that wants to start a business, regardless it’s online or a brick-and-mortar establishment. However, there’s one top reason why an online business is the best investment. You need less or no money to start an online business. Instead, you can utilize existing resources and your skills.
Resources you can utilize for free include your home that can double up as your office, as well as your computer and Internet connection. Surely, you’ll already have these resources and use your skills to start an online business. Because your skills will enable you to open a business about something you know, this also eliminates the need to hire an expert or outsource tasks and pay for them.
Understandably, there’s no business that can start with zero investment. However, an online business enables you to drastically reduce any launch related expenses. So, you will first need to ask yourself why you want to start this business. All you’ll pay for is electricity, Internet connection and of course your skills and efforts.
No Need for Your Own Website
A website that includes hosting, domain name and other necessary resources will cost you at least $100 per year or more. This depends upon the type of hosting and plans as well as domain name type among others.
However, you don’t really need to invest on your own website for an online business.
There are several ways to set up an online business. You can create your own website for an online business by buying a domain name, hosting and other necessary resources. Or you can use readily available resources.
For example, if you’re setting up an online business that sells something, there’s no need to open an own ecommerce website such as Amazon or eBay. Instead you can open a free online store on Facebook Marketplace and promote your business locally. And if you want to reach customers across the country and abroad, you can open your own marketplace on portals such as Shopify.com and Etsy.com.
You can also promote products and services for free through a LinkedIn profile.
Opportunity to Explore New Markets
The ability to explore and enter new markets within a specific region, country or even the world is yet another top reason why an online business is the best investment. Because, you cannot really control who sees your website or marketplace online. It could be your neighbor or someone sitting thousands of miles away on a different, distant continent.
Also you try to attract more customers for your online business from abroad because their product could be more relevant for a specific country or geographic zone of the world. Furthermore, if you wish to expand operations to a newer market, you can easily customize your product or services and provide information in a foreign or regional language.
Expanding operations to distant markets is much easier when you have an online business compared over brick-and-mortar ones. This directly translates as higher profits. Indeed, your business can become an instant international hit if you provide products and services that are legit and in demand.
Various Digital Marketing Options
It is very easy to perform a wide variety of digital marketing processes for an online business. And digital marketing costs a fraction of the price of conventional marketing. Before proceeding, I’ll briefly explain the difference between digital marketing and conventional marketing.
Conventional marketing involves promoting a business through advertisements on newspapers and magazines, billboards, signboards, hoardings and posters, leaflets, TV and radio commercials and LED displays, among others. These cost a mini-fortune and are of limited duration.
Digital marketing costs a fraction of that cost but allows your business to be visible to millions of people worldwide. Digital marketing means promoting your business through Google Ads, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram tactics, Pinterest and other mediums on the Internet.
Digital marketing is a combination of various processes. You can either learn digital marketing yourself by watching excellent online tutorials or attend a small course to learn the basics. If that’s not possible, you can hire a freelance digital marketer or hire one on a part-time basis. You can find countless digital marketers with excellent skills on websites such as Upwork.com and Flexjobs.com, among others.
Benefitting from Shopping Seasons & Festivals
Large online retailers including Walmart among others, have special sales for seasons such as Black Friday and festivals including 4th of July or Independence Day. Hence, they are able to grab a lot of customers during these shopping seasons and festivals and boost their sales. Additionally, they also become popular among first-time shoppers by providing them a different shopping experience.
These shopping seasons and festivals are one of the top reasons why an online business is the best investment. As we mentioned earlier, you can find customers from far and wide to buy stuff on discount during such sales, and you can also get a lot of first-time clients.
Furthermore, you’re also free to offer discounts and special offers all through the year on all or specific products and services. This keeps your business evergreen by bringing in more customers throughout the year.
Make Money While You Sleep
An online business can be your best investment because it helps you to make money even while you’re asleep. That’s because your website or online marketplace is accessible round the clock and anywhere in the world. Therefore, people can place orders anytime. Unlike a brick-and-mortar business, you don’t need specific timings to open or close an office or store.
Secondly, online business also enables you to engage in affiliate marketing. This means, you will provide a small commission to bloggers and website owners, social media influencers and others to promote your online business. Whenever anyone makes a purchase and doesn’t return the stuff, you have to pay them a small fee. Usually, bloggers will write honest and superb reviews about your online business and provide an affiliate link that allows prospective customers to contact you or place orders.
Several Channels for Customers
You can provide several channels for your customers to make a purchase. One of them is your own website for the online business. Another is marketplace on Facebook or other ecommerce platforms. Third is through affiliate marketing. Then you can also provide links to place orders on WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Pinterest and Instagram, among others.
YouTube is an excellent channel that you can utilize to market and sell products and services to your customers. People love to watch real life stories and experiences of people. If you can post excellent testimonials from real people about your business, you can definitely boost your business.
Often, YouTubers provide a link to their website or ecommerce pages for people to place an order immediately.
Doing Business Alongside Employment
Even if you’re working and have a regular, full time job, it’s still possible to launch an online business as a side gig and make money. This is a unique advantage that only online businesses offer. Since you don’t need to be physically present at a store or office to manage your business.
Nowadays, there are several excellent widgets, apps and plugins available for online businesses. They automate almost every process of your online business. Thus, you don’t have to stress over minor details. A lot of these widgets, apps and plugins are available free or for a small monthly or annual subscription. However, they enable you to automate several processes and remove the hassles of running an online business.
Some of the processes that can be automated easily include sending email confirmations to your customers, order tracking, passing orders to a third party supplier, tracking payments and customer history and lots more.
Online businesses also enable astute business analytics. Means, you know where your business is coming from and what is selling for how much.
So, Why Should You Start an Online Business?
Online businesses can be very appealing because they don’t have the traditional hurdles that most new companies face. There are no overhead costs, you don’t have to pay rent or monthly expenses in the beginning (except maybe for marketing) and you aren’t locked down to a single location, so there is very little reason for you not to try to build your online business. Surely you’ll find these reasons attractive enough and reassure you that an online business is the best investment you can make. You can also avail various exemptions from government authorities for running an online business and make it legit.
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