ONLINE BUSINESS FOR BEGINNERS

Don’t worry that you are new to e-commerce and the online business model.
This page will give you an overview of what passive income is and how you can start earning it.

First, What Is E-Commerce

Let’s make this really simple. “E-Commerce” is short for electronic commerce. Electronic commerce is selling products or services in a manner that doesn’t require a physical store location. The biggest e-commerce business you may be familiar with is Amazon.com. Amazon is a non-physical retails business that sell everything from books to furniture to electronics and everything else under the sun. People don’t go to an Amazon store. They use their computers to purchase everything electronically i.e. from the computer, tablet, or mobile phone. The medium for purchasing is the Internet.  In addition to actual products, Amazon also distributes electronic content. That content includes movies via their Amazon Prime services. They have a book program where you can electronically “borrow and return” books to read for a monthly fee. Amazon sells music electronically. No need to go to a physical store when you can either download or stream the music. Amazon makes money with membership services. Amazon Prime is a membership programs that offers many services for an annual fee.

Amazon isn’t the only company that sells products online. Walmart, Home Depot, The NBA Store, and other well-known corporations do business with e-commerce. Many small businesses have started online businesses to sell their products, book client services, etc. And there are now a growing number of individuals that have learned how to make money exclusively online. Over the years, a number of easy to use tools have leveled the playing field and have allowed folks that desire to make their income through e-commerce. So that is basically what e-commerce is. You already likely are (or have been) a customer for an e-commerce company. However, your probably thought that you’d never have an opportunity to become an owner of your own e-commerce company. 

The Benefits of Owning An E-Commerce Business

The incredible and most amazing thing about owning an e-commerce business is that earning income doesn’t rely on the typical way you are familiar with when it comes to making money. Most people earn money by trading their time for dollars. Those dollars are usually in the form of a full commission, an hourly wage, a weekly or monthly salary, or some type of base pay plus commission combination. The drawback to that method of earning income is that is requires your direct input of time to earn the income. If you don’t work or can’t work, you typically risk not getting paid. And if you don’t work for an extended period of time, you not only risk your income but you also risk losing your lifestyle (home, car, utility bills, credit card payments, etc).

Having an online or e-commerce business is slightly different. Your income is based on people purchasing your products and/or services without your direct input of time. In other words, if you have an Amazon-like business, you can make money without actually going to work to earn it directly. Let’s start with a simple example. You are a fitness coach. You teach a group of people how to get into shape. You charge a client $50 for a one hour session. Each morning, you meet with 4 clients at the local gym and train with them so you’re making about $200 per hour.  Not a bad income for an hour’s work. The downside to that is your income is fully dependent on you being at the gym and working your clients out. That’s trading time for dollars. But now let’s say your want to start to supplement your income with something online. 

Let’s say you create an online course that teaches proper exercise technique and dieting for losing weight (and yes, online courses are considered e-commerce businesses). You decide to offer the course to a particular niche audience for $300. You only have to invest the time to make that course one-time. It may take you 2-3 weeks to create the course but you don’t have to recreate the course each time you want to make money. You spend a little bit of time marketing your online course to others and it starts to take off. While you are out in the morning training clients, your course is being purchased and downloaded by people that came across your material. In the hour that you may have been training your clients, your online course could be downloaded 2-3 times and passively bringing you an additional $600-900. That money did NOT require you to trade your time to earn it.

How You Can Start Your Own Online or E-Commerce Business

I’m going to share a secret with you. It is incredibly simple to start an online business. The starting point for an online business is a website. And all websites have three basic ingredients:

  1. A Domain Name 
    This is the name you are going to register and operate your e-commerce business under. When you see “www.abusinessnamehere.com”, that is the domain name. This is the name that customers will use to find your products. These names used to sell for $70 per year back in the day. However, now you can register a domain for as little as $10 per year if you know where to go. And here’s a tip: we can show you how to get a domain name for free. So if you want to start your business and you’re on a budget, you definitely want to join our group.
  2. A Website Hosting Company
    A web hosting company is exactly that – they provide the computer network of servers that will house your website. When someone types in your domain name, the Internet looks for the server that has that website. You pay the company to have access to their servers and they agree to keep your website up for you. Many of these companies will also agree to give you (at no cost) website building software so you can create your own e-commerce website. 
  3. A Professional Email Address 
    When you have a professional website, you don’t want to ruin the first impression by having your email with Google (G-Mail), Microsoft (Hotmail or Outlook), Yahoo (YahooMail), or anything else that shows you don’t own your own email account. You must have a professional email address that matches your domain name. In fact, some services that you will need to market your products and your website will require that you have a professional email account.

What Else Will You Need To Get Started

What else you will need depends on a number of factors and the type of e-commerce business you will be starting. Let’s start with a few branding your new business. Your brand is your online identify and is made up of your business logo, your brand colors, and your typography or fonts that you will use. You will learn how to develop these very quickly with the E-Com Startup Club.

You may need a social media presence. In other words, you will likely need to create a Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube account for your online business. You may not use them all but you definitely should at least register the names for down the road. We will show you the steps to doing that so you won’t be alone.  

And you will need a number of specific tools for marketing your online products. The E-Com Startup Club will provide you with a list of free, inexpensive, or trial period resources to get your business up and started. We’ll show you how to market to people while you sleep and make money will you are on vacation. I guarantee that these tools will change your life when you discover them (and more importantly, how to use them).

How Can You Make Money

I’m sure this is the part you’ve been waiting for – when we tell you what products you can sell. Well, I have bad news for you. We don’t have any product recommendations for you. What we do have are the various ways you can create passive income. I’ll share that list for you right now with a few sample products. However, it will be up to YOU to find the actual products you want to offer within the various categories. Here’s a caveat: Find ONE category and stick with it. Don’t try to do everything because you can’t decide or because you think you’re good at everything. Trust me that if you don’t focus, you will fail before you get started. Here’s the categories and sample ideas:

  • DROP-SHIPPING – Drop shipping involves finding companies that will makes products and are willing to ship them directly to your customers for you without you having to handle the product first. Items that can be drop shipped are clothes, household items, electronics, fishing gear, makeup, jewelry, etc. 
  • ONLINE COURSES – Online courses involve teaching people a specific outcome through video, lectures, slides, demonstrations, and downloadable guides. You create the course, your price it, and your market it. You can create an online course teaching people math, business skills, parenting, cooking, health & wellness, writing, organizing, etc. 
  •  SOFTWARE/APPS – You can create your own software or apps. It can be  a game, something that improves productivity, something that helps people learn, helps people make or save money. 

This is an actual course that I created to make money. My target audience is established photographers that are struggling to earn an income despite the fact that they are already great photographers.   ~Kevin Colts

 

  • E-BOOKS/PDFs – Think of all of the books you’ve ever read. Now imagine writing one that people can download. Your book can be a work of fiction, a biography, a how-to book, a self-help book, a diet book, etc. If you’ve ever wanted to become an author or create guides that help people, this is a great way to make money. 
  • ADVERTISING – Imagine having a website, blog, podcast, or YouTube channel so popular, companies will pay you to advertise to your audience. You make money selling advertising on your website or you can monetize a YouTube channel and earn money each time an ad is played before, during, or after your video is watched.
  • MEMBERSHIPS – A membership program is getting paid either a monthly or annual fee for providing a service. Examples are you have a membership-based website, an application or software that requires a recurring payment, etc. Memberships are a great way to know how much income you will make each month.
  • TEMPLATES – These are items you create and sell as starting point for end users to modify to their own needs. Templates you can sell for download could be social media posts, Photoshop files, fill-in-the-blank forms, websites, booklets, wedding invitations, resumes, slideshows, etc. You create a products that save people time from starting from scratch. People will pay you for those templates.
  • AFFILIATE PRODUCTS – This is the granddaddy of all online products. Affiliate products are like drop shipped products with the difference being you market their product (courses, software, eBooks, memberships, templates, etc) instead of directly selling it. The company will provide you a tracking code within a link to their product. You get paid a commission when someone makes a purchase through your link. Companies with affiliate programs include Amazon, Walmart, Go Daddy, and Progressive Insurance. There are affiliate marketers that earn 6 figure incomes marketing other companies products.

How Will You Get Clients

The one question that concerns beginners in this business is how to get clients. The answer is two-fold. You will get clients by providing them with valuable content. Valuable content is information that will make their lives easier. You basically find out what people want and you give it to them. And what do people want? Everyone wants things that are going to add value to their lives. Here’s a sample list:

  • make more money
  • save more money 
  • be more productive
  • be healthier
  • safety and security
  • peace of mind
  • make a difference to others
  • better relations with others
  • love and happiness

So the first thing to give people is valuable content. They way you provide this content is super simple. We will teach you all of the steps. Remember you won’t need to do all of these so don’t let the list scare you if you don’t know how to do them all. But here are the mediums you will use to provide content: 

  1. A Niche Blog
  2. A Niche Website
  3. An E-Commerce Store
  4. A YouTube Channel
  5. A Facebook Group
  6. A Podcast

The second thing is to make them offers in a simple, efficient, and non-threatening way. You will make your offers through a proven system of email marketing that consists of landing pages, lead magnets, opt-in forms, and email funnel sequences. You will utilize automated software to handle all of the heavy lifting for you. Once created, your system will do the job of finding ideal clients, building trust with them, and then selling them your product i.e. your affiliate products, courses, software, eBooks, templates, membership program, or drop shipped products. The system will do all of the work after you set it up. The E-Com Startup Club will be here to help you with the systems and the setup process.

What You Need To Do Next

So there you have it. You now have a good basic understanding of what E-Commerce is, how you can benefit from having an e-commerce business, and how you can actually make money from starting you own e-commerce online business. The first thing you should do is decide that this is what you want to do. Once you make the commitment, the rest of the decisions are easy. 

 

  1. Start Thinking About What You Want To Sell To Make Money   Will it be drop-shipped products, an online course, a series of e-Books, selling affiliate products, downloadable templates, or a membership program. If you’re just starting, my suggestion is start with an online course or affiliate marketing. Courses offer more money. Affiliate marketing has products that you don’t have to create or sell.
  2. Start Thinking About Who You Want As Clients  Who are they and what do they need?  Are they men, women, couples, families. Are they married or single? Do they own businesses? What are their hobbies? What will make their lives easy.  What outcomes are they seeking? What goals, dreams, and aspirations do they have? This isn’t about you. This is only about your audience. The only part that is about you is YOU get to choose who you want to serve.
  3. Start Thinking About What Valuable Content You Will Provide We will show you how to create the content for your future clients. You need to decide how you will offer the content. Our suggestion is to create a website first. Then you can decide if you want to share the content via the website, a blog, a weekly podcasts, creating a YouTube channel, or starting your own private Facebook group.