Lower Costs
If you already have a product to sell, what's the initial cost to put up a web site to sell it ?
Here's a round down:
. Domain name registration, $8-35 per year
. Web hosting, $0-35 per month
. Advertising, $0-100
And that's it.
Actually you can get everything done for free except domain name registration. So the
minimum cost to start selling online is $8!
I mean it, everything. And in a professional way. Web hosting (without ad banner),
affiliate program management, credit card processing, mailing list, CGI script...
I'll let you know where to get these services in the following lessons.
Even if you would buy all the most professional and expensive services and software
right from beginning of your online venture, it shouldn't cost you more than one thousand
dollars.
Typically, $100-200 is what you need to start an online business from scratch.
Online business is much cheaper to run as well. You don't have to pay for office rental or
equipment. You don't have to employ anyone before you make 1 million dollars.
Once you put everything into autopilot (we'll talk about that later), your running cost will
be nearly zero.
By-pass Middleman
Internet was regarded as advertising medium several years ago. It's not the case any
more. A web site is now better understood as place of doing actual business, actual
transactions.
Online direct sales enables you to jump any distribution chain that ratchets up prices to
the end user. It means much higher profit margin for you, lower price for your customer,
or both.
In traditional business world, distribution and retail cost can be up to 90% of the selling
price! Now you can pass part of that savings to your customer and keep the rest in your
own pocket.
In fact, a really scary development to many manufacturers is the growing temptation to
sell directly on the Web and by-pass the complex distribution chain they have built over
many years. The manufacturer doesn't want to anger distributors and dealers. But
buyers don't care. Neither do you.
Sales Process Automation
Nearly everything can be put into autopilot for an online business.
From product presentation (the site itself), information inquires, price quotation, to
payment processing, order fulfillment, customer service, just to name a few. Even the
profit will go into your bank account automatically!
All these can be done while you are sleeping or having fun with your family at beach!
This is rather impossible for off-line business.
It then translates to more leisure time, or better, more time and opportunities to develop
your next online project. Therefore, more money ahead.