How To Choose The Right Online Business Model

There are a lot of people who would love the time freedom and financial abundance that comes from owning a successful online business. After all, not everyone is working their dream job. And, even if they love their job, they’re not happy with the hours they work or the low pay.

Do you dream of having more financial abundance and time freedom?

You’ve probably already figured out that you are never going to gain financial abundance and time freedom working for someone else.

And, you’re never going to gain time freedom building a brick and mortar offline store, while this can make a great business for some, it’s also a huge time suck.

If you truly want financial abundance and time freedom the best (only?) way to get it is to start an online business.

Why online?

1. You really can start an online business with very little money
2. Limited financial investment means no limited risk
3. You can have a virtually unending supply of customers from around the world
4. You can be making money 24/7 all day everyday…even when you’re not online!
5. Many of your tasks can be automated or outsourced so you can run your business with just a few hours a week, from anywhere.

Now that you’ve got some really good reasons for starting an online business you need to decide which type of online business to build.

There are 4 basic types of online businesses you can build:

E-COMMERCE

Usually these websites sell physical products, though not always they can also be used to sell digital, downloadable products too.

If you create your own products, this can be a great way to get your products in front of potential customers.

Even if you don’t create any type of product, you can easily find wholesalers that will dropship products directly to your customers for you. Dropshipping is an e-commerce model where you find a company that sells the products you want to carry in your store, say jewelry for this example.

When a customer comes to your online store and buys a necklace, you then order that necklace from your wholesale supplier at the wholesale price. The wholesaler will ship that necklace from their warehouse to your customer. Your customer won’t know the necklace wasn’t sent directly from your warehouse!

The upside for you is that you don’t have a big cash outlay for inventory. You simply order products from your supplier after a customer has purchased them on your website.

You will need a website with payment processing capabilities, there are many companies that offer this service for a monthly fee and a cut of your sales.

It does take some time, a few days to a few weeks depending on how much time you can invest and how many products you carry, to set up your store.

AFFILIATE SALES

This is probably the easiest online business model, since you don’t need your own website. An affiliate marketer is really just a commissioned salesperson, but online you send people to a website, you don’t talk to them.

There are many different affiliate markets you can join for free.

You can sell physical products or digital products, or both.

Once you sign up to sell a certain affiliate product you will be assigned your affiliate link. This link is a unique url with your affiliate ID embedded in it. When you send someone to your affiliate url, and if they make a purchase, you get a commission.

The vendor is the person who is selling their product or service using affiliates. They do most of the work – they set up the websites, provide advertising banners and emails, and deal with product returns.

The affiliates job is simply to drive as much targeted traffic as they can to their affiliate url.

BLOGGING

Have a hobby that tons of people are passionate about too? Things like bird watching, golf, sewing, etc. Well, if so, you could start a blog.

On your blog you would post helpful videos and articles about all things birdwatching, golf or sewing.

You may be wondering how you make money doing this.

There are actually several ways to monetize your blog – you can sell products such as binoculars to the birdwatcher, customized golf tees for the golfer, or sewing kits for the seamstress.

Also, you can become what is called a publisher and allow search engines to place ads on your website. When someone comes to your site and clicks on one of these ads you earn a small commission.

Also, those affiliate products I talked about above? Find some affiliate products related to the topic of your blog and add some banner ads (with your affiliate ID) to your blog. Then when someone clicks on the banner ad and goes to your affiliate url and buys that product you earn a commission.

MEMBERSHIP SITES

This type of online business is perfect for anyone who has a lot of knowledge and experience that is in high demand.

This business model makes it easy to sell coaching, mentorship or just products you’ve created – ebooks, video courses, etc.

These sites can be set up as a membership sites where people join and get charged every month they remain a member which is a great business model.

You can provide a monthly coaching newsletter, webinar, etc. And, you can increase your revenue by offering add ons such as one-on-one coaching.

Don’t sell yourself short either and make the common mistake of assuming you don’t have any special knowledge or skills that someone would be willing to pay you for.

You’d be amazed how much people value expertise when they’re trying to learn a new skill… and how much they’ll pay for it!

MIX AND MATCH

If you read my welcome blog post you already know a little about me. You know that I struggled for years to find success online.

DO NOT make the same mistakes I made. Pick the online business model that you’re interested in and stick with it.

Don’t go chasing other “opportunities”. Eventually, after you’re making money, it’s a good idea to start up other income streams, but in the beginning just get your first business going before you try to take on something new!

Just don’t run before you can crawl.

Choose your business type and be willing to invest your time and money into courses that will teach you new skills or in tools that will automate your business, then move on to set up another income stream.

IMPORTANT TIPS

As an online business owner you will be learning many skills, one of the most important is how to send traffic to your website or affiliate offer. Traffic = customers, and to be successful you need a steady flow.

An important thing to remember is that there is no such thing as “free” when it comes to traffic.

All traffic will cost you either time or money.

Free traffic does work but it will take longer to create a steady flow.

Paid traffic will be more immediate results but it will cost you money.

You have to balance your time and your budget to determine which method you will use.

If possible, invest some money in paid traffic to get things up and running quickly while simultaneously starting to build your free traffic sources.

Eventually you may have enough free traffic where you can discontinue your paid sources. But to get your online business off to a quick start, begin with using paid traffic while you’re building up your free traffic!

Don’t be shy, if you have a question or comment, leave it below!