Setting up IT

Information technology is daunting to many entrepreneurs. Each little sub-field of IT has its own culture and terminology. It is difficult for novice to understand all of jargon and to determine truth from hype.

You will not be successful if you try to separate yourself completely from technology, but you will also not be successful if you immerse yourself in it. You must understand IT decisions from a business level in same way they you understand decisions which your business makes in terms of setting prices or acquiring real estate.

The most obvious need for your new online business will be a company web site. This will introduce you to professionals known as web designers. If your business sells more than a few products online, you will also have to work with database administrators. If you want to sell an automated service online, you will find yourself working with software architects and software developers.

From there you will learn about shared and dedicated hosting and about plethora of services (and pricing) available to you as a hosting customer.

The key in these communications is that each of these professionals owes you, as their customer a clear explanation of business value which they are providing for money which you are paying them. This may be an unfamiliar concept to many techies who grew up in public school system. Remember, there are always more vendors for a willing customer.

In many ways, IT is easiest challenge you will face, because so many entrepreneurs have trodden path before you. An entire industry exists to market IT services to entrepreneurs. You only have to decide what to buy.

Selling Online - Successfully

Once your have negotiated with your suppliers and you have you distribution system arranged -- now comes difficult part. Now you must bridge gap between your business and your customers.

Most Internet traffic is currently brokered by search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, and MSN. To do well in business on Internet, you must do well in search engines.

This means appearing very early in search results for key words or phrases your potential customers will use to shop for your good or services.

Very few potential customers will look for you by name. You must determine phrases which potential customers will type into search engines and make sure that you rank well in result listings for those phrases. Product types or names are common search phrases, such as "sleeping bags" or "bumper stickers." Key phrases for services often include a geographic component, such as "real estate kansas city" or "house painter colorado springs."

Once your key phrases are defined, you must make certain that your company's web presence is optimized for those phrases. This consist of two sets of tasks: on-site optimization and off-site optimization.

On-site optimization is designing your web site to be focused on those key phrases. This is where your web site designer will work with a professional in field of Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

Off-site optimization consists of networking with others in your field to make sure they know about your web site -- and that they link to your web site. The top search engines use number of links to a web site as one of criteria for determining which web sites to rank highly in search results. A SEO specialist can help you in this task, but no one will know your industry as well as you.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is critical to success of an online business. The difference between ranking third and thirtieth for your key phrase is significant revenue for your business.

The eBay Alternative

The tasks involved in setting up a web site and driving traffic towards it can be time consuming and resource intensive for a small business. The time delay imposed by website development and search engine marketing can require many months to begin to deliver ROI.

Many web entrepreneurs use eBay and other online auction houses to short-cut this process and begin selling to online customers almost immediately.

On eBay, you create auctions for products you are selling and potential buyers bid to determine what they will pay. You are able to set minimum prices to ensure that you will not sell products at prices below your necessary profit margin. You are also able to set up dutch auctions where you are able to sell large quantities of same item.

Summary

The options involved in becoming a successful entrepreneur on web are extensive. Picking right path for you own journey is your first step on road to online success.

Will Spencer is the webmaster of Entrepreneur Support.

Ask your insurance carrier about your responsibility for insuring your team members. Whether you hire Independent Consultant's or Employees is a topic for another article, however, you need to make certain that your company is covered.

Determine your time-off policy. Just like you, your team members will need time off - whether to recover from flu or just to re- charge. How will you handle these absences?

Create a disciplinary and review process. Whether you need to tackle issues of poor performance, or chronic absenteeism -- have a policy in place before you bring on your first team member. Questions to address in this process include: How many emergency absences are acceptable in a given time period? How will you deal with customer complaints and concerns? How will you reward outstanding performance? What format will you use to communicate with your team?

Find a reputable company for conducting background checks. If your company’s product or service requires your employees to access clients’ homes, children or possessions do not overlook importance of conducting a background check. You can search on web, ask your insurance provider, or talk to your local police authorities for recommendations on companies to conduct this check for you. In each instance, you will need applicant's signature and understanding that you will have a third party conduct a background check as a condition of employment.

Create a Fact Sheet for Applicants that you can provide along with an application to interested candidates. This sheet should cover your basic job description, expectations and hiring process.

Create your training program. Whether a detailed manual or one-on-one training for a specified period of time - make sure you have a written outline. Your training program should include all aspects of job you expect your new hire to complete. Many misunderstandings and frustrations occur simply because a new hire didn't understand expectations of boss.

By following these tips, you are well on your way to a happy and productive working relationship with all your new help!