Guest Post by Elizabeth McGee of Homenotion.com
Creating my own virtual business on the web hasn't been without lessons learned.
But there's something about having your own business, and earning your own income, that gives you a new perspective on business both personally and professionally.
As I look back on this past year and celebrate almost 8 years of being online, I would like to share with you the 10 most valuable lessons I have learned along the way.
Some may surprise you, some may encourage you. But they are all meant to enlighten, and perhaps give you a new perspective on what it takes to have a business on the web - and make it successful...
Lesson #1 No Successful Business is Without Hard Work
Creating a business of any kind isn't especially hard, but it does take hard work. Having a plan and working your plan is key to any successful venture. But even before developing a plan you'll need to start with research. That means considering a business idea and understanding how to put that idea to work for you.
Significant shortcuts and unrealistic promises of quick riches are a dangerous path to follow. A simple but important saying to keep in mind is that if an opportunity sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
Lesson #2 Don’t Hide Behind your Computer
This is a tough one for many people, since the virtual world of the internet makes it easy to operate without being seen. But don't be tempted to hide who you are.
Your internet business isn't like the corner drugstore, there's no drive by traffic or neon signs to help you get seen. The success of your business is highly dependent on the connections you make both socially and professionally. So taking full advantage of the opportunities to weave you into the social web is a smart and a brave move 🙂 The more you can connect, the more successful you will be.
Lesson #3 You Get What You Give
Have you ever noticed that people will often listen to you, follow you and even buy from you if you can teach them something first. In other words, give them something they can use or something they can value and they will return the favor. Learn to look at your business as not about what others can do for you, but more as an extension of what I can do for others. The more you give the more you get back. It’s also a very valuable life lesson.
Lesson #4 Invest In Your Business
Investing in your business will increase your productivity, your professional image and ultimately your profitability. If you make $1000 for instance, the temptation is to spend it. After all we are in business to earn an income, however make it a practice to reserve at least 10% of what you make to put back into your business for things like training, advertising, tools or services that can help you grow and promote your business. Your business will be one of your biggest investments, so treat it as such.
Lesson #5 Making Money vs. an Entrepreneur Mindset
An entrepreneur is someone who brings something to the business world that wasn't there before. The entrepreneur mindset looks beyond making money and is focused on new ideas, solutions and opportunities. They reach beyond themselves for a greater good. Someone whose interest is to simply make money will put their focus on only making money and making as much of it as possible.
From my experience, this type of individual will often not love what they do, have difficulty connecting with others, lose patience quickly and will not be as successful, even fail. Which mindset do you want to have?
Lesson #6 You Can't Be an Expert in Everything, So Don't Even Try
A business owner wears many hats but if you're spending too much time on non-essentials and less time on the things that will actually help your business become profitable, you'll lose energy and become discouraged.
Do what you are good at and delegate the rest. The internet is full of reasonably priced services and virtual assistants that can help you streamline processes and offload the work that is keeping you from being productive.
Lesson #7 Stay Focused
This is a hard lesson learned as working online is riddled with distractions. There are only so many hours in the day and if they are filled with non-productive distractions like Twitter, Facebook, advertisements, phone calls, kids, etc., you won’t be able to keep your head above water.
To be productive in your business means to focus your attention and turn off the noise. That means having an overall goal and then developing a plan for that goal, starting with your 5 year plan all the way down to a daily plan. Your daily plan should include a map to your daily tasks and the discipline to stay focused on getting those tasks done.
Lesson #8 Have Confidence in Yourself
Have confidence in who you are and what you do. Never allow others to belittle or demean your ambitions. Keep yourself surrounded with positive supporters and tune out the naysayers. But also never look at others with a jealous eye or think of them as being better than you. Comparing yourself to others leads to pride and insecurity and that’s not a healthy practice for any successful business owner.
Lesson #9 The Customer is Always Right
I use to hate that phrase; we all know the customer isn't always right. The real meaning behind that phrase is letting the customer believe he is always right. For many, that’s a hard concept to absorb, but it’s a necessary one.
Protecting your customer relationships as well as the relationships with colleagues and followers needs to be a priority. I certainly don't agree with everyone I cross paths with online but I know the importance of dealing with everyone professionally and respecting their ideas and opinions.
Lesson #10 Stay Persistent
I keep persistence as my motto. In fact I have it posted on my office wall. There will always be moments of disappointment and rejection but never let that become a show stopper. Every problem has more than one solution and there’s always more than one way to do something. Keep your thinking cap on and keep moving forward in patience and persistence.
What are some of the internet business lessons you’ve learned and how have they most impacted your business?
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About the Author: Elizabeth McGee is the creator of Homenotion.com. An Internet Home Business resource center with easy to understand tutorials, step-by-step guides, candid product reviews and personal, friendly support. Click here for your Free Internet home Business Getting Started Guide
About Lynn Terry
Great post about lessons! I think that invest in your business is a hard one for a lot of people to learn, especially when they're just starting out. I know at first I resisted investing in anything, even the smallest of things, and looked for "free" options. It took a long time for me to make that leap into investing in tools, resources, and educational materials to help me grow, and oh was I ever glad that I did!
I like #4 and #5 Lynn. Reinvesting in your business is important, if you negect this it will wither away and die.
It's obvious that those who focus just on money have empty lives and offer nothing of value(I don't count money), to their customers. If we concentrate on quality in everything we do, money will flow naturally from that. 8)
John
Thanks for sharing Elizabeth, it is always interesting to get a glimpse into other peoples online journey.
If I were to give one piece of advice to a complete newbie, I would have to tell them that they need to define in their own mind, the difference between 'making money online' and 'building an online business'.
The kindest thing I could then do would be to point them in the direction of the place that will best serve them in learning all the lessons they are going to have to absorb, which is, of course, right here!
Elizabeth most people can't focus because they are too business trying to find the next traffic program instead of focusing on building their websites naturally..
"Black Seo Guy "Signing Off"
I have learned I don't need another "How to start an internet business" pdf. I need to just do it and stop looking for a better "how to".
Great information I need to focus and follow those steps
Excellent lessons! Staying focused is the one that I struggled with a few years ago but once I stopped trying to find the next best thing, everything started to fall into place. Also believing in yourself and having the confidence that you CAN make a difference AND still make good money is very important.
Great stuff, Liz!
Great lessons to learn. I really enjoyed reading this, Elizabeth. Many are lessons we all know about, but it always helps to "revisit" them and [re]set our priorities according to these lessons. Great timing at this time of year when many of us are reviewing our goals and objectives for the new year. Thanks for posting this. :)[and thank you, Lynn for hosting :)]
Excellent set of lessons. If there was an 11th lesson I think it would be find out what you are best at and choose an online business model that usses this skill.
All The Best
Alex
I really like this post Elizabeth.
I think #8 is a tough one to deal with. We all know how many hours are involved in just getting off the ground level,and our own family wonders why we are wasting so much time on the internet. Unless you have a very understanding patner, it usually takes some money coming in to win over most people.
I absolutely agree about not hiding behind your computer! key point. This year I joined my local Chamber of Commerce as a board member and it's been great. Very important to get out there with real people. Goes along with "Get what you give." Nice post, and thank you!
Like Elizabeth McGee said keep moving forward in patience and persistence. If we all do that we all will get there for sure.
Thanks for sharing Elizabeth. I think having patience is one of the hardest things for me.
I think I'd have to say that patience and focus were two of the hardest for me and it looks like they are a common thread for many of our comments here.
But I think just recognizing our shortcomings is a really good start though.
Thank you for all your great comments and input 🙂
Thanks for the great post.
Focusing on the main issues in which you are more efficient is really hard when almost everything depends on you at the beginning.
On the other hand, it´s true that an entrepreneur must go further the next year´s turnover in spite of short term naysayers.
In my case, my business plan goes beyond what it is meant to be now, diversifying to other product and service lines between Japan, Europe and US, though now we concentrate in EU mainly.
One question : what should I do to make work my affiliate program with amazon.com, amazon.co.uk, amazon.fr and amazon.de ?
Thanks again
Follow me at @injoyingjapan on Twitter.
Hello Elizabeth I really like your post. especially point 2. I think it's very critical. I didn't notice it before. Thanks to Lynn to allow you to post this one.
Cheers
Semmy
Hi there Elizabeth! What great lessons you shared up there! #10 really speaks to me. I am working on being more and more persistant when doing things. I tend to put my heart into a project or section of my business then fizzle out quickly when at 1st I don't succeed!
Happy Holidays,
Aurelia
Reading these 10 tips will be useless if we will not follow them at heart and take action. I'm enlighten of tip #4. I'm committing myself now to set aside at least 10% and invest it back to my online business to make it grow more, like hiring virtual assistant in blog promotion.
The most important lesson for me is to stay focused! For a very long time I tried to do 10 projects at the same time - and as result - all of them failed!
Thank you for these advices. They are really important especially for newbies.
Hey Valentine, staying focused is a big one for me as well.
I've had several things going at once which is tough. I miraculously was able to make some money with spreading myself thin, but it's a lot harder.
Like Lynn suggests, focus on one thing first until it becomes profitable, then move on to the next thing.
Also once you get your primary project making some decent money you'll be able to outsource more and that's how you'll begin profiting with your other projects.
Perfect post for this time of year. This is when many new ventures will start or people will be evaluating the previous year to see if it was worthwhile. Keeping in mind that it's hard work and persistence that pays off hopefully will inspire people to continue. Happy New Year!
A very appropriate post! I'm still a struggling newbie, but what I'm finding most wonderful about having a nascent business is that I get to nurture it, grow it, water & feed it. I get to go inside of "me" to find out who and what is in there that demands expression without anyone telling me what I can and cannot do within the bounds of decency! I am becoming more and more excited coz my creativity is beginning to bloom!
As someone who has always worked in brick and mortar businesses, starting an online educational website has been a challenge. Following each of these suggestions every business day will bring you closer to your goals.
The most important lesson for me is to stay focused! For a very long time I tried to do 10 projects at the same time – and as result – all of them failed!
Staying focused is something I really want to work on this year. It is so easy to go to facebook and then loose a couple hours.
So I am working on a plan to only spend so much time there until all my work is finished.
Thanks for this amazing article and for reminding me of so many things.
Hey Skipper, that's so significant to what blogging is all about, being creative. Even if you're not a creative person blogging has a way of bringing it out!
It's an impressive article that I ever read, when it comes to tips in business. Lesson #9, is sometime annoying 🙂 but it's part of dealing with business, we have to be patient when it comes to this. We have to give them more importance than ourselves.
All lessons are absolutely right and to the point.
Lesson #1 hits my heart. I was struggled for over a year, follow few get-rich-quick programs. I wasted money, energy and time before realizing the fact that there is no easy way to get profit on the Internet without value contribution and good connection.
Stay focused is my huge problem. Ok, I'll back to work now.
Thanks so much for sharing.
For me the hardest thing is to delegate, somehow i trust that i can do it all. Not true of course.
Thanks for sharing this "reminder" as we move into 2011.
A really inspirational post and so true. There's real focus in your 10 points and most if not all ring a cord with me. For me its all about energy levels, when you put effort in & results don't come, its hard to keep pushing forward. Thanks for the inspiration
Toby, that's often a problem with any kind of business. Putting in a ton of effort with no results is exhausting and discouraging. Sometimes you have to change gears and that can also be an insurmountable task.
We need inspiration and we need motivation. Those things aren't always available to us when working at home, but being social, joining communities, groups and forums can help. Thanks for your input 🙂
Liz
Hi Elizabeth,
"Don't Hide Behind Your Computer" is something many affiliates have a hard time to accept. I remember, James Martell, my affiliate marketing mentor, would always say in his 26-week bootcamp that I attended, that we need to place our picture on our site and clearly show who we are.
Hi Liz!
Nice article. I would like to offer tip #11, it's all empty unless we have some FUN! too.
Thanks for your service and time in putting the information together.