Sacking your boss is not as easy as 1 2 3! But here at SurfingEntrepreneurs.com we hope you find the website informative enough that you will endeavour to become an online entrepreneur and earn online

We have compiled useful articles and packed the website with enough resources enough so that with our information advice and guidance you will succeed in your starting your own online money spinner.

To start earning online you will most certainly have to have a web presence, whether you choose to sell items online or write a blog and sell advertising there are many decisions to be made. First read this article A Beginners Guide. 

Starting an online business - Beginner's Guide

The first dot.com boom was a period when the normal laws of business were temporarily suspended. But the laws of business cannot be suspended for long. They eventually re-assert themselves.

The Schumpeter creative destruction at the end of the last dot.com boom had some good effects. It created the technical and marketinfrastructure  needed to support this second, more sustainable dot.com boom. This has created tremendous opportunity for entrepreneurs.

Like a bricks-and-mortar firm, the new dot.com will rise or fall on the fundamentals. In addition to a solid business plan, a new dot.com needs additional elements to succeed. This article provides a summary of the basics you need to get started.

Hosting and E-Commerce

Choose a domain name (yourcompany.com / yourcompany.co.uk) and a hosting company at which to host it. Your choice of hosting company is important because their reliability and ability to increase your capacity smoothly as needed are crucially important. Your e-commerce hosting account is likely to start out as a “shared” hosting (less expensive option) and later may grow to a “dedicated” server(more capacity but higher price) later, if needed.

However, the good thing about hosting is that if your host turns out to be unreliable or is unable to scale up to meet your needs, you can always switch hosting companies. Just make sure that you register the domain name under your name and not theirs from the beginning.

Decide if the goal of your website will be to capture leads (which can be done through simple contact forms), which you will then follow-up on later by phone and/or email. Alternatively, is your goal to make direct sales from your website, in which case you will need a shopping cart system. Regardless of your goal, you should also provide good quality content on your website that will capture your prospective customer’s interest.

Most hosting companies offer a shopping cart (such as Miva Merchant) with their e-commerce hosting accounts. Find out which cart they offer, and do some research to make sure it is a reputable system. Find out how user friendly the system is for non-technical people to setup and maintain an online store.

In addition to the hosting and shopping cart system, you will need a merchant account that will enable your business to accept electronic payments (e.g., credit cards). You may already have a merchant account, especially if you now run a bricks-and-mortar business. For online transactions, you will also need a Payment Gateway (such as authorize.net or Verisign).

The Payment Gateway authorises payments for online businesses. Generally, these services will interact automatically with both your shopping cart system and your merchant account. Once setup, all this happens behind the scenes so your website is selling your products or services day-and-night, without you having to be directly involved. Someone from Australia could buy something from your site while you sleep.

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