Don't Spend Money On Your Site Before You Start Earning
It is amazing how people continue to ignore successful and
popular online business models, when there is so much that can
be learnt from them. While creativity is not a bad thing, most
folks seem to prefer to re-invent the wheel rather than take the
easy path to success of studying what other success stories have
done.
One of the most common online business models calls for a
website to be launched on a shoestring budget where the cost is
close to zero. The spending of the site then increases with its'
success. In most of the cases so far, successful sites have
quickly attracted colossal amounts in venture capital
funding.
Today there are numerous examples of site owners doing the exact
opposite. They start off spending heavily. Predictably when the
funds run out, the flashy expensive site fizzles out and goes
belly up shortly after.
Advantages Of Starting Out With A Zero Budget
There are several advantages of starting out your website on a
budget that is close to zero. The most obvious is that you get
to learn your market well before committing any funds. You
actually find the customers to finance your website. In a way
this is an advanced method of market research in that if you do
not find enough customers to make your website viable, then the
business is not viable in the first place.
Legendary entrepreneur, Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor
Company and inventor of the modern assembly line as we know it
today was a firm believer that a business should finance itself
into existence. If it did not attract enough customers to do
this then it had no right to exist in the first place. He was
very much against banks heavily financing new businesses. He
even used his own business to prove it. The Ford Motor Company
was started on a shoestring budget and was heavily financed by
its' rapidly increasing customers.
Whatever you think of Henry Ford and his business ideas, there
is no denying the fact that they worked. Ford ended up a
billionaire many times over. The really exciting thing to note
here is that it is much easier to launch an online business on a
shoestring.
Start With A Free Site That Does Not Look Like A Free Site
Most of your expense in an online business will tend to go
towards you establishing a website and paying for web hosting
services. Naturally you can avoid this expense by going for a
free site. The only problem is that most free sites look cheap
and unappealing with "free site" written all over them.
However there are a few sites that have such a high standard of
design and presentation and have such a high number of templates
that they do not look like free sites at all. Sitekreator.com is
one such site.
This site enjoys the following key advantages. Tools are so easy
to use that your setup time will be close to zero and you can
have a professional looking website up and running within the
hour. Secondly many webmasters value the site's seamless and
easy integration with merchant tools such as Paypal as well as
the professional business-oriented templates that make it easy
to attract the paying clients in the first place.