The constant expansion of the Internet has made trade opportunities accessible to everyone. Earlier, starting a business was an enormous commitment in terms of finances and risk. Business owners quit their current jobs, obtained a loan from the bank and signed leases before they began to make any money. It is no wonder that more that 50% of them failed within a few years. Today, business opportunities are easily available to anyone willing to invest the time and effort to learn about the world of e-commerce. You can establish an e-commerce business with nominal funds and very little risk.

It has been proved by studies that as many as 70% of customers first research the net about the product and only then buy it. It is also true that these days; people prefer shopping online rather than going to a market to buy a product. The best point about buying online is that one can compare the products, their features and even the prices they are being offered at. Thus one can easily select a product that is reliable, trustworthy and has a good review about it.

Thus it is very important to get educated about the basic things you need to do as an online retailer in order to be successful and sell your product, prior to starting the online business actually.

Below are a few steps that will help you get your ecommerce business started.

Find Your Niche

The first step in starting your own e-commerce business is to find your place. Take a look at your hobbies and interests for possible business ideas. You can also think about opening a business that is related to your current job. For example, as an automobile mechanic you may know a lot about automotive spare parts and how to obtain them. You could possibly start an automotive spare part supply business. Your contacts and knowledge in the industry will give you an advantage over other competitors who may not have the know-how you possess.

Research the Demand

Now that you have a few business ideas running in your mind, it is time to study the demand in that field. If you are planning to open your business to the general public, you need to find out how many people are interested in and are looking for the products or services you are making available. As a new business owner, you may not be able to create a demand for the product you are marketing, hence the products you are selling, must already be in demand.

Scope out Your Soon-To-Be Competitors

Before you finally decide on a business idea, research your potential competitors. You must visit and know your competitor’s websites thoroughly. Spend some quality time exploring each one. By doing this you will have an idea of what kind of competition you have. Bear in mind, that your website must be equally professional or better than theirs. The following are some of the things you need to look for:

• Professional Look & Feel

• Products and Services

• Search Engine Ranking

• Page Rank (Available on the Google Tool Bar)

• Keywords

• Back Links (how many sites link to them)

Establish a Business Entity

Next, in order for you to conduct business, you need to create a business entity and obtain a sales tax ID. At the register office they will check if the name you have selected is already in use or not. If it is in use you will have to use another name. Having one or two options before you start is a good idea.

Open a Business Bank Account

Once you are registered as a legitimate business owner, you need to open a business bank account with one of the banks in your city. Take your documents to the bank and open a business account. Most banks offer a variety of business accounts. Choose one carefully, the one the best meets your needs. It’s usually best to start with the least expensive account because it could be a while before you start getting an income. Some banks require you to wait a specified amount of time after the court documents are filed before opening a business bank account. These rules are in order to help prevent fraud. Check with your bank to obtain waiting period information.

Choose a Domain Name

As you are waiting for your bank account to be active, you can start building your website. Firstly you need to register a domain name. Search for names that end in ".com" as these are the best option. If it is possible your domain name should include one or more of your target keywords. For example, if you are starting an automotive spare part business, choose a name with the word automotive or automobile, such as automotivepoint.com or vehicleparts.com.

Create Your Website

One of the keys to a successful ecommerce business is having a professional website. Your website will probably be the only impression your visitors will have of your business. A professional looking website can be the key difference between your visitors viewing you as an ordinary everyday home-based business or a multi-million dollar business with hundreds of employees. Fortunately today, you do not need to be a high tech web programmer to create a professional looking website. There are many companies that sell professional website templates, or you can have a custom made website. You can get a website template for free, but it is advisable to invest a bit of money for a highly professional template. After all it is your business that you are projecting through the website, so it should speak of quality. You must look to get a good template with many pages and professional images. Most templates can be customized with simple HTML editors and an easy graphics program. Templates can be edited without having to invest a lot of time and energy into learning how to write code for web pages.

Open Source Solution

If you are interested in Open Source software then you can go in for Oscommerce, the open source e-commerce solution provider. It is released under the GNU General Public License. They offer everything that you will require for launching and running a successful ecommerce based website. It handles the customer order, product catalog etc., by using administration tools that are easy to install and configure according to your business requirements. Your domain hosting should support PHP & SQL. That is the only requirement you will have to meet.

Paid ecommerce Solutions

You can alternatively opt for paid e-commerce solutions; Yahoo Store is one solution provider. You need to pay a reasonable amount of money to start with Yahoo store but the quality of service offered by Yahoo is great and it is worth the investment. They have ready-to-setup ecommerce solutions from designing the store, adding the products and setting up payment methods

Host Your Website

Once that is settled, you will need to ensure that your website content targets specific keywords. You can do this by creating articles, product reviews, product comparisons and a detailed description of your products. Try to avoid repeating the keywords too often. This makes the text difficult to read. There is a very slight difference between good copy text and spam text. Spam text is mainly intended to increase your site’s listing in the search engines, but this often goes bad when penalties are issued and your website is dropped from the listing.

After your website has been created, you must find a web hosting company to host your website on their servers. The web hosting company should generally take care of technical support and should also provide email accounts with your domain name. Domain name-specific email accounts are very important for a professional image. Your website files can be easily uploaded with a simple FTP program. Normally the hosting company’s technical support personnel can help you to upload your files and launch your website.

Implement a Shopping Cart

Every ecommerce website must have a secure shopping cart. There are many options when looking for a shopping cart options to choose from:

Best of all: Merchant Services

A gateway and a merchant account are a must for a shopping cart. Credit card transactions allowed to businesses that are carried out on any bank account is called a merchant account. In the merchant account, the gateway enables a secured connection over the transaction which plays a very crucial role. One can even make use of the merchant accounts of the shopping carts in case you don’t have a merchant account of your own. However, in such a case you have to pay more amounts to the shopping carts.

Hosted Shopping Cart

If you earn monthly around $1000, you should opt for a hosted shopping cart which is a great option for those who do not have a shopping cart of their own because of lack of resources. These shopping carts we have just talked about have much similarity to the merchant services available. You can enter your own price, product list and the shipping choice in the interface provided by them.

Fully Integrated Shopping Carts

If you have a business that is ‘booming’ then the shopping cart that is completely integrated is a better option. Just as your website, the shopping cart will provide a similar interface to you. These shopping carts contain features that are not found in merchant service or hosted shopping carts. Say it is possible for you to display the reviews of the customer, discount items, make multiple categories of products, sort out the prices of the products and also make the estimate for the shipping of the products.

Many ecommerce business owners make the error of using PayPal to accept payments; this immediately shows visitors that their company is very small and not professional. A good substitute to PayPal is a remotely hosted shopping cart. Remote shopping carts will take the burden of maintaining security and credit card numbers off your shoulder and transfer the responsibility on another company. Remote shopping carts can usually be configured to look similar to your website. In reality, your customers will not notice that they have left your website to place an order. When your prospective customer clicks on the ‘Buy Now’ button, he or she is transferred to the remote shopping cart to enter the personal information and payment details.

Stock Your Inventory

Now that your website has finally been created, you need to stock your catalog. The first step is to find the manufacturers of the products you wish to sell. You can find this information by reviewing your competitor’s websites. Some of them may list the manufacturer with the product name or description. Alternatively you can look online or in the ‘Yellow Pages’ of your telephone directory. Once you have the name, you can search for the manufacturer online.

Contact the manufacturer and let them know that you are looking forward to becoming a distributor. Ask them for a detailed wholesale price list and an application. The price list will help you establish if the profit margins are high enough to justify selling their product.

You might want to ask the manufacturer the following questions:

• What is the MSRP (Manufacturer Suggested Retail Price) for the item?

• Am I required to sell the item at MSRP?

• What is your minimum order quantity/amount?

Promote Your Business

Your website is up and running and you are open for business. It is time to advance to the step of promoting your website. If no one knows that it exists, you will not receive any sales. Most website visitors begin from search engines. Before a search engine can list your website, they have to know that it exists. You will have to submit your website to search engines and directories such as Yahoo!, DMOZ, Excite, Google, AltaVista, Ask and others.

Starting your own e-commerce business involves a lot of work. Making it a thriving business is even more work, but the pay-offs can be greatly satisfying. Due to the increase in technology and the explosion of the Internet age, ecommerce business opportunities are now available to anyone with a computer, a few hundred dollars for start-up costs, some spare time and the desire to create a business.