STEP 1 - WHAT DO YOU WANT TO ACHIEVE?

The first thing you need to do before starting your online venture is decide exactly what it is you want to achieve. Are you wanting sell your goods and/or services online? Do you want to increase your market share? And are you targeting a local market or an international market? Perhaps you simply want a website that you can send clients and enquirers to for more information or maybe you just want to build a community-based site that family, friends or members of your organisation can interact in? Whatever your objective may be, you need to have that objective clearly defined so you can then efficiently do the next step.

Your goal should be measureable such as "I want to gain 500 new enquiries by the end of the year" or "I want to earn at least $100,000 by the end of the year". It may be something as simple as "I want to finish my website within the next 2 weeks". A measurable goal will help to determine how much time and money will need to be invested in order to achieve it.

STEP 2 - WHAT IS YOUR TIMEFRAME AND BUDGET?

Once you know what your goals are, you then need to assess how much time and money you are willing to invest per day, per week or per month on firstly creating your website/online business and then how much ongoing time and money you are willing to spend on maintaining your website/online business. The higher your goals and the quicker you want to get things done, the more time and/or money will be needed. For those of you who have never run a business before, it is absolutely imperative to understand the relationship between time and money. In general terms, it can be said that the less time you have, the more money you will need and the less money you have the more time you will need. Fortunately for most of us, we are only lacking in one or the other. If you are lacking in both than it is probable that it will take you longer to achieve the same goals as one who has either time or money at their disposal.

Nobody should expect to make money online without investing either some amount of time or money. The good news is, there is a method of making money online to suit every situation. Just remember though that your success is related to the amount of time, money or both that you are willing to invest in building and maintaining your business. The only condition to this is that you must also be spending your time and money wisely. That's where my website www.247home.biz can help. I've spent thousands of dollars and many more hours on researching which methods actually produce a return on investment. If you would like suggestions as to which online money making methods are most suitable for your situation then please fill out the questionnaire found at my website.

STEP 3 - CHECK THE RESOURCES YOU HAVE AND GET THE RESOURCES YOU NEED.

I have included this step for those who are new to the internet so that you will be prepared with the resources that are needed to build and operate websites for profit or leisure. Below is a list of resources that you will need or at least may find helpful.

1. Firstly, you will need access to the internet. I know that is stating the obvious but just in case you don't have regular access to the internet here are few ideas.

i) Your local library or community centre will most likely have internet access for free or at very low cost.

ii) If you have your own laptop then check your nearest fastfood or coffee franchise. A lot of the big franchises these days offer free wireless internet access to their customers.

iii) You may not realise it but your mobile/cell phone, if it's a relatively new one and has a good web browser built in, might have all the access to the internet you need. If you are thinking of upgrading to a new one then consider phones like Apple's "Iphone", Google's "Android", Palm's "Pre" or similar phones that have excellent web browsing capabilities. Just remember to check with your mobile/cell phone provider to see what charges for data usage (internet access) apply. Most providers have a data plan but be sure to check if there are any charges for going over any limits and for roaming costs (roaming means access to the internet from outside your provider's network coverage).

iii) Finally, if you are really serious about working from home then it's worth investing in true broadband internet at home. These days in Australia we have something called "Naked DSL" which is basically broadband through the telephone line without having to actually connect and pay a telephone company for the telephone line rental itself. You only pay for the broadband connection and usage.

2. As mentioned above, you can actually build and manage your website from your mobile phone but due to screen size restrictions you will probably want to use a desktop or laptop computer. To build websites you don't have to go for the latest or most expensive models. A pentium 4 with 1 gigabyte of ram and a 17" monitor may suffice. For laptops, the recent "netbooks" from MSI, ACER and the like which have 10" screens and use Atom chipsets should work fine albeit the screen resolution may be a bit small and the computer may slow down a bit when multiple programs are open.

3. You will also need some form of website hosting so you can promote yourself, business or your goods and services on the internet. For an intro into website hosting have a look at the "Get Online!" section of my website. Your options range from free website hosting to "total service" website hosting which includes tools to market your website. Most of these services come with website building tools that are fairly easy to use but for those of you who are either really lazy or find it daunting to build their own website, for a limited number of people per month (I can only do so many at a time).

4. Finally, there are a whole range of tools that will definitely help your online endeavours. I would recommend PayPal, Skype and a free web-based email service as essential starters in your online arsenal. Paypal is pretty much the most popular online payment system used for online transactions. It is popular because once you register you basically purchase goods and services with only your email and a password instead of having to type in a credit card all the time. Skype will allow you to make free calls to other skype users but if you get a subscription, you can also make international calls to many overseas destinations for free as well.

STEP 4 - PLAN YOUR MARKETING.

Once your website is up and running you need to then market your website. Actually, let me correct myself. Before you create your website, it is better to plan your marketing first. Because sometimes how you build your website depends on how you are planning to market your website. Planning your marketing and planning your website really go hand-in-hand. You can market your website online or offline meaning you can promote your website through the internet or through non-internet based or traditional marketing avenues such as newspaper ads, flyers, word-of-mouth or simply displaying or handing out business cards to potential clients or where potential clients would visit.

Online Marketing
In terms of online marketing there are free and paid methods of marketing (the free methods require more time, whereas the paid methods will normally attract potential customers fairly quickly). The main methods that people use for ONLINE MARKETING are:

1. Paid ads with search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing (previously MSN Live Search). This is how it works. You register with the search engine ad program (eg. Google calls their program "Adwords"). You create your ad(s). You then setup where you would like your ad(s) to show and with which search words you want your ad(s) to be associated with. If you are not sure what I mean then click www.google.com or type it into your browser, then type in "travel" into the search box, click search and see what comes up. See all the ads that display on the side and at the top of the search results? They are ads that people or businesses have paid for though Google's Adwords program. Also notice how the ads that appear are relevant to the country you are in? That's because Google is clever enough to show ads that are specific to the end user and you can choose which countries your ads are displayed. Nifty, hey? Anyway, to join the Google Adwords program or similar programs you need to sign in (create a free account first if you haven't already), click on my account, then click on "Adwords" or equivalent and join the respective program. You can set budget limits on how much you want to spend per day or per click on your displayed ad.

2. So how does one get listed on the first few pages of search results without having to actually pay to appear there? Simple. It's called search engine optimization or SEO for short. While SEO is free, for your website to have successful SEO you will probably need to pay someone to do it for you or do a lot of research into how it works but this may take a lot of trial and error and time. At this point I want to put out a warning about some people and companies that prey on new internet entrepreneurs. They call you out of the blue (they would have found your contact details somewhere on the internet) calling themselves SEO professionals who promise to get your website in the number one ranking on the major search engines for a fee that normally runs into the few thousand dollars. They will entice you by running through a demo and examples of their so called "clients" and maybe even offer a discount. DON'T FALL FOR IT! Your best bet is to do your own research and due diligence about which company you choose. A safe bet which also keeps you and your budget in control is to have a look at some of the online courses and TOTAL SERVICE web site hosting services that offer marketing tools with their hosting service. One such service that I would highly recommend is SBI SITEBUILDIT. I have gone through their step-by-step guide/course that teaches you about SEO quite thoroughly and have started to use their principles in my websites. They do state honestly that gaining top rankings in search engines will take some time and their principles do work and the best thing is they are always keeping their information and strategies up-to-date and are very user friendly. One of the key things they stress is that your website doesn't necessarily have to be about making money in order to make money. It's all about creating good content that people will appreciate, something you are passionate about but that will have a wide enough audience to turn those visitors into customers.

3. The second paid method of gaining exposure to your business or products is Affiliate Marketing. This is where you register with an affiliate portal so that other people can "sell" your business on your behalf by promoting "links" to your affiliate webpage. In return for making sales you pay them a commission. The complicated side of things is all worked out for you by the affiliate portal. The great thing too is that you don't pay commissions until someone actually purchases something from you. The flip side to this is that this is where you can also make money through your website and marketing activities by promoting and selling the products and services of thousands of other vendors who will pay you commissions for your sales of their products. The additional dimension to this that you can then search the internet for websites that you would like to exchange "links" with so you can promote each other mutually. This is called link exchanging.

4. Another free way to gain visitors and therefore potential customers is to use a blog and/or social networking site(s) such as Myspace, Facebook and Twitter. This method requires you to build up a "following" or "network" of friends and interested people by actively posting interesting comments and news on your and others' sites (or pages in this context). You can also "blog" or write about something that you are passionate about but that other people would also find interesting enough to visit regularly. You want to show genuine interest in people who visit you and leave comments. You then reciprocate by visiting their site or page and just as a social butterfly will rise the social ranks of their peers for actively mixing and mingling so too does the social "cyber-networker" and if you decide on this path, remember nobody likes a person who ONLY talks about their business or tries to SELL at every opportunity. People are attracted to those who have charisma, charm and humour yet respect other's opinions and personal space. That doesn't mean don't talk about your business at all. Just be subtle by talking about your business after you have offered something first. It could be as simple as a hello with positive feedback and after a few more visits leaving positive comments then simply mentioning a link to check out. As I don't frequent social networking pages much this is not the best option for me but for those who love spending time on Facebook and the likes then this is a great method to use, and it's FREE!

Offline Marketing
Now don't forget about OFFLINE MARKETING which includes things like putting ads in local or national newspapers, leaving flyers and business cards in businesses or even handing them to people on a street corner as well as giving them to everyone you meet. You should also consider banner advertising at local sports events or you could also consider sponsoring your child's sports club. Then there is direct mail through the postal or other delivery service and magnetic banners or vinyl-cut lettering on your vehicle. There are hundreds of different avenues for offline marketing and it doesn't have to cost the the earth. Be creative, be bold and be patient (this also applies to online marketing).

A lot of people start a marketing campaign and because they don't get a response in the first few days or weeks, they give up without really letting the "law of averages" take hold. What is the law of averages? It is a "law" common in the field of sales that states that as long as one does a certain action (such as give out business cards) long enough it will eventually return a positive result (such as a phone call). This "law" requires time. For example, if you stood on the corner of a busy shopping mall and asked a negative question like, "You don't need insurance do you?" despite the majority of people saying no, you don't let the no's bother you because there will always be a small percentage that say, "Yes, in fact I do". In the first few days there might be no positive responses. But after a month you get 30 people that say "yes". Now you have an average of one "yes" per day (based on a 30 day month) whereas in your first few days you had an average of zero. So the law of averages would suggest that over 12 months of doing this you should get an average of 360 potential clients. Not bad even if only half of those people actually signed up for insurance with you. Now, it isn't a precise science but you can see how it is very important to keep this in mind.

So, whatever business you start and how ever you do your marketing, to succeed you really need to give your marketing plan some time to produce results. You need patience and persistence. It also helps to get good advice or a mentor who is successful in what they do. For an overall but detailed guide to marketing your online business I found SBI SiteBuildit! to be extremely good with suggestions and strategies, especially considering how cheap it is. In fact, all of the money-making avenues I suggest in the "Make Money 24/7" section of my website come with pretty good marketing resources. Some even have samples of business cards and flyers so you don't even have to design one. Speaking of which, if you are wanting cheap or even free business cards and promotional merchandise, check out Vista Print.

STEP 5 - BUILD AND LAUNCH YOUR WEBSITE!

Now that you've got your marketing plan sorted you can start building your site, or if you already have a website, re-build it. Depending on the way you like to work, you can build it on the computer or internet from the the start. If you are like me, you will plan most of your website, if not all of it, on paper first before starting anything on the computer. Once you have an idea of what pages, menus and content will make up your website you can then start filling in the content of your website pages. You can do this on pieces of paper that represent your web pages or you can use a word processor (I often start with Notepad which is included free on most computers). You could also build it straight online if your website hosting service has a website building program included. It should be located in your control panel (often called cpanel or admin page) when you log into your hosting service. Some hosting services offer it as an extra and most services have tutorials that will guide you through the website building process.

If you want to start with a simple blog-style website then check out "Wordpress" which can normally be found in a section of your hosting service called "Fantastico" (included in most but not all webhosting services). Otherwise you could try services like squidoo, blogger and even twitter (you already know about hubpages which is also great). Just sign up and start posting/blogging and remember, don't post too many sales-type entries. Post content that people will be interested in and then sprinkle it with links to your money-making websites (for more about money-making websites go to the "Make Money 24/7" part of my website www.247home.biz.

That wraps up this 5 step guide to online marketing. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions or comments. I wish you all the best in your online endeavours!