Creating A Web Business On The Cheap

September 21, 2008 by OnlineIncomeCreator
Filed under: Make Money Online

Here’s a question my great friend Jim Daniels gets all the time…

“Jim, I want to make money online and have a few ideas, but I’m flat broke! I mean, I could probably scrape up, at the most, $15 per week — but that’s about it… should I forget about it?”

Here’s my advice to financially challenged folks who want a web business…

Don’t quit your day job just yet… But DO get to work growing your own business in your spare time. Yes, you can grow your own business online with less than $15 a week, and I will show you how today.

I know that may sound absurd, especially when businesses in the real world usually cost anywhere from $10,000 – $200,000 to start. I also realize there are many companies out there selling “turnkey web business opportunities” for anywhere from $1,500 – $5,000 and more.

So where do I get off telling you that you can do it all on less than $15 a week?

Easy, I’m a real cheapo at heart! I got started with next to nothing, and you can too. And believe me, things were much more expensive online when I started out.

Nowadays you can get a great website design program for $0, an FTP program for $0, web hosting for $3, payment processing for pennies, website promotion for $0, and that’s just about everything you need.

In fact, here are the essentials for any web business, including the web’s 10 best no-cost and low-cost solutions available. You’ve probably never heard of some of these solutions, but they are solid, reliable, and dirt-cheap.

Essential #1: Your Own Website

The first thing you’ll need when starting a business online is a website or a blog. Whether you plan to make money selling your own products and services or selling as an affiliate, you need a “home base” to direct your prospects to.

Cheapo Resources: Here are the top low-cost and no-cost resources for building your own website…

NVU.com – This is one of the best website design programs on the web. With it you can design your entire website. You can start from scratch or use a pre-designed website template. This program rivals programs costing hundreds of dollars.
Cost: $0

EZMinisites.com – A great source for pre-designed website templates. But not just “pretty” templates — these professional templates contain all the sales components of top selling websites. BizWeb eGazette subscribers get 10 free templates…
Cost: $0

50Webs.com – Once you have a site designed, you need a web host. This host gets great reviews from their customers and businesses get quite a list of features for just $3 a month with their start account. If I were on a very tight budget and just starting out, this is the host I would use. (While you can find free business hosting on the web, most include 3rd party ads on your site – a big no-no.)
Cost: $1 per week including domain name

FTP Commander – If you’re going to build a website you need a way to upload the files to your web host. This tool is easy to use and comes with the perfect price tag…
Cost: $0

WordPress.com – If you like to write then you may prefer to go the blog route instead building a website. Using this web-based blog building platform you can get started in less than an hour.
Cost: $0

Blogger.com – Another top-notch blog builder.
Cost: $0

Essential #2: Growing Your Email List

At your site or blog, your number one priority should be to give something of value away, such as an ebook, so you can collect opt-in email addresses. This will grow a growing pool of prospects that can be contacted regularly.

In order to get started with this task, you need two things… a giveaway such as an ebook you write yourself, or acquire master rights to. And a service that will help you grow and manage your list.

More Cheapo Resources:

OpenOffice.org – With this tool you can create your ebook. This awesome program rivals Microsoft Office, but without the high price tag. Plus, the word processing program called OpenOffice Writer, (looks like Word) has something really neat built in. I call it an instant ebook creator. In a nutshell, you can write content in the word processor then when you’re done, click File, Save As, then save the file as a PDF document. You have an instant ebook! Now that’s a great feature. Especially considering how much you pay for this entire suite of tools…
Cost: $0

Aweber.com – A web-based autoresponder is one of the essentials when trying to make money online. Aweber is the web’s top (at least in my opinion) autoresponder service. With it you can deliver your free ebooks and grow your opt-in email lists. It will also follow-up with prospects automatically and allow you to broadcast to your lists. There are free versions of autoresponders on the web, but this is something important enough to pay for. Especially when you consider how much Aweber costs…
Cost: Less than $5 per week

Essential #3: Taking Payments

If you’re selling products and services as an affiliate, you can skip this step, as the merchants will handle all customer payments then pay you a commission. But if you plan to sell products or services of your own, then you’ll need a way to take payments. Years ago I’d tell people to get a merchant account for this. But with an average cost of $500 or so, this is really not the best choice for small and home web businesses, at least during the start-up phase. That’s because other options are now mainstream and far cheaper.

Still More Cheapo Resources:

PayPal – Millions of people use this payment solution online now. It is so universally accepted I increased my sales by 20% overnight, simply by adding paypal as an option for my customers. And there’s nothing wrong with having paypal as your only payment option ether. As far as costs go, unlike standard merchant accounts, you don’t pay unless you make sales — that alone makes it a nice fit for new businesses.
Cost $0 setup and per transaction fees

ClickBank – Similar to paypal, this site lets you accept credit card payments for your goods — as long as they are digital, such as ebooks and other downloadable products. Clickbank has an added advantage though — they have a network of more than 100,000 affiliates you can tap into instantly. They charge more per transaction than paypal, but their vast network of affiliates can more than offset the extra costs.
Cost $0 setup and per transaction fees

Let’s wrap it up for today…

A bit of quick math show us that we’re at about $6 a week. Who says a web business has to be expensive?

In my next issue: Getting Traffic. Low-cost and no-cost web marketing that actually works…

* This message brought to you by: Peter Safe In affiliation with JDD Publishing Co.
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Smithfield RI 02917P.S.If you need personalized, one-on-one assistance through each stage of growing your business, that’s what Jim does.

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