Tips for turning your small business into an E-business

With how many people already access the internet it comes as no great surprise that e-businesses are becoming more and more popular, The reason for this is that e-business allow the customers to do everything from the comfort of their own homes when it is convenient for them, not to mention that when running an e-business the costs to keep the business up and running are usually a lot less than running an actual small business. If you are a small business owner who is looking to turn your small business into an e-business then this article is perfect for you..

Here are some tips that you can follow when turning your small business into an E-business.

Tip one:
The first thing that you are going to need to do to turn your small business into an E-business is to get a domain name. The average price for a domain name should be around ten dollars, so places may charge more or less so it is a good idea to shop around. There is really no need to go with a higher priced domain name site because all of these sites serve the same purpose. Many of you might be thinking that you can use a free space to create a website but to set up a business that is not a good idea. The reason for this is that having a domain name gives you a direct name for your website such as bobsbusiness.com, where as a free space site is going to give you the name bobsbusiness.freespace.com. Also search engine results do not work as well for the free sites so you are better off paying for a domain name.

Tip two:
Now that you have a domain name you are going to need to find a host. There are free host sites out there but once again you will want to try to avoid these because they can affect your website in other ways such as no domain name or just the lack of quality. The price you pay for a host depends on what features you are going to want with your hosting account. If you are setting up a simple one page site that you are going to do all the work for then you can probably expect to spend around five dollars a month. If you are going to need help with templates and layouts it will cost you extra but that can be a piece of mind because the web pages will already be set up. Also if you are going to experience a lot of traffic or downloads you are going to need to pay extra to ensure that your host is providing you with enough bandwidth to handle the amount of traffic on your website.

Tip three:
Something else that you will need to do to get your business online is to design your business's website. You can do this by using templates that are available for free from various websites or you can use templates provided by your host. But the thing to remember when using templates is that other people have access to these templates so your layout might look the same as your competitors. If you want to stand out you should look into getting your website designed by a freelance web designer or a student who is studying web design, if you are really ambitious you can also take courses in web design and do the page yourself. The good thing about students and freelancers is that they do not charge much because it is helping them to build experience which can be put on their resume for later in their career.

Tip four:
Once you have actually gotten your small business online you are going to need to advertise that your business is now online, to both your loyal customers and any new customers you might be able to attract. If your business already has a marketing plan you will need to make changes to this plan to include marketing on the internet. A lot of times you can keep to your same marketing plan but make slight changes to include your new website. For example if you hand out notepads to your customers you will need to have new ones printed up with your website listed. But the most important tool is to use internet marketing techniques, such as pay per click advertising or exchanging links with other companies' websites.