Want To
Make Money Online? Market A Service To Businesses
by: Kevin Nunley
Don walked across the
street from his house to mine to announce he had finally
retired. "But I'm not ready for the golf course," he
said. "I want to make a living on the Internet. What can
I sell?"
This is a question many
of us struggle with as we see money, freedom, and a
bright future for those who manage to find their niche
online. You may have tried to sell something from the
Internet only to find it is difficult to get visitors to
your web site and even harder to get them to buy.
The biggest hurdle is
simple: most folks are trying to sell products to
consumers. That's not where the money is. It is a more
daunting task than most realize.
Only one percent of
retail sales happens on the Internet. Even though
selling to consumers should be gargantuan one day, we
have a long way to go before the majority of people are
placing orders the Internet way.
Instead, sell something
to businesses. While consumer sales amounted to many
billion last year, business-to-business purchases
vaulted to a whopping ten times that much. Clearly, if
you want the easiest path to tapping into the landslide
of Internet cash, sell a product or service needed by
business.
So, you say, I should
sell a product to businesses? Not exactly. Most products
need to be sold in large volumes by many distributors
before they turn a profit. Chances are the product you
sell is also being pushed by hundreds or thousands of
other affiliates. In the end, many business buyers will
simply click to the main corporate site to make their
purchase.
Your best bet for
starting a small Internet business and earning a living
online is to sell a service to businesses. Unlike
products, it is hard to mass produce a service. Most
service providers find their competition is relatively
thin. This is especially true if you provide a very
specialized service or do your job in a particular way
that is hard to duplicate. Because services require time
spent by an experienced expert, rates can be high,
especially for business customers.
But I'm not an expert in
anything people on the Internet would want to buy, you
exclaim. Not true.
Sit down with a pen and
jot down all the things bosses have paid you for during
your work career. Add to your list things you have done
on your own time that friends, neighbors, or co-workers
have felt were valuable.
Which of these things
could be sold on the Internet? If you kept books for a
business with twenty employees, you can sell your
bookkeeping service to the vast number of small Internet
businesses who don't have the time or expertise to
manage their growing firm.
If you produced your
church newsletter for several years, your desktop
publishing and editing skills could fill the hot demand
for people who can write and publish e-messaging
campaigns, web sites, and print newsletters. Best of
all, a writer/editor deals in pure information which is
easiest and cheapest to deliver over the Internet.
My neighbor Don decided
his skills from a career in law enforcement would be
hard to sell on the Internet. But he knew lots of things
businesses needed and he had a list of town residents
who could fill those needs.
If you don't readily
have a service you can sell to business, find someone
who does. Many in-demand people don't know how to market
themselves on the Internet or haven't the time to try.
Represent their service online and take a commission for
each sale.
Put up your own web site
with some articles business customers will find helpful.
They can do double duty, showing you know plenty about
your line of work.
Post testimonials from
satisfied customers or other experts in your industry.
To get full impact, be sure to list the person's full
name and the name of their business or city they live
in.
Offer to send customers
and prospects a monthly update via email. Include brief
updates on important developments in the industry. Mix
in three line ads promoting your service.
Selling a service to
business is your least-expensive way to get started
making money online. It is also the quickest way to tap
into the huge amounts of money traveling from business
to business.
