Bruce Von Stiers

Are you considering starting up an e-commerce business? Have you thought a little about it but didn’t know how to get started? If so, then I have a book that you really need to check out. It is called TechTV’s Starting An Online Business. It is from the folks at TechTV and Que Publishing. The book was written by Frank Fiore and the staff at TechTV.

First of all, this book was first published just about a year ago. In the world of the Internet, that may seem like the material in the book would be too dated, but it actually is not. Although things have moved along quite a bit in e-commerce since a year ago, this book gives you the basic fundamentals of online business that are still holding true.

The book has four sections with twenty-four chapters. It has a ten page glossary and an extensive Index. The book has 349 pages.

The first section is called Staking Your Claim. The chapters in this section cover some of the more necessary information that you will need to know before embarking on a career as an online entrepreneur.
The first chapter is Putting The “E” In Commerce. This chapter tells you about how online business has exploded into something that the original pioneers of the Internet never envisioned. It has sections within it like “What makes eCommerce Special?” which explains how the Internet has allowed small businesses to operate as if they were one of the big boys by operating online.

The second chapter helps you identify the types of business that can be successfully operated online. It will give you some guidelines on how to learn your customer’s needs and what they would like to see in the near future. The next chapter covers things like being a part of an affiliate program It deals with online auction services like e-Bay. This one isn’t too bad a suggestion. I have a friend who was making a ton of money on e-bay for a while.

Chapter 5 has information about how to set up a business plan for your online venture. Learn what type of market you will be entering and how much traffic it will bear. The chapter covers things like figuring out how you will promote the product once you make it available online. The following chapter deals with finding the financing to get your online business started.

The whole second section of the book is about going through the basic steps of setting up an online business. There are chapters on things like finding a way to get your web site hosted for free or setting up as web host yourself. From there the section moves on to helping you understand the various elements needed for putting together an online store.

The third section is called E-Commerce Basics. It takes all of the parts of e-commerce and gives you the etiquette for each. In the chapter titled The 3 C’s of e-Commerce you will learn about providing great content, building an interactive community among visitors to your site and having varied revenue streams going to provide even more commerce opportunities. Chapter 14 covers The Seven Cardinal Sins of e-Commerce. Things like being vain about your site and thinking you can do it all are discussed here. Trying to sell something online that does well in the non-cyber world might not be the right way to go. Just how much money do you need to make off of a product? And are your web pages so filled with junk that the person with slow dialup service will get frustrated at your site and never visit it again? This chapter tells you how to avoid situations like that.

Other parts of the book cover things like promoting your e-commerce business through sources like PR firms. That in itself is a great idea. I work with several PR firms to receive material for review. Most of these firms are staffed by folks eager to help promote your company or product. If you become successful, it is a definite feather in their caps if they have helped you out at all. The book also covers ways to avoid driving potential customers away from your site.

This book is not the end all for people wanting to start an online business. But it does give you a lot of solid information about the basics of setting one up and keep it running. There are some things that might not apply at this point and time but overall it gives you the overall big picture on how to start an online business.

TechTV Starting An Online Business can be found at major book retailers. I was at Barnes and Noble last weekend and they had the book in one of those end-of-the-aisle racks. It has a list price of $ 24.99 U.S. It can also be ordered from Que Publishing at www.quepublishing.com.