Online Entrepreneur

Starting an online business in South Africa is not for the faint hearted. You need courage, tenacity, superhuman willpower and above all, a lot of patience.

There are a few steps involved in starting an online business and it is important you follow all.

Here are a few pointers to help you get going:

Web-Site Starter Kit

Domain Names

The first thing you’ll need is a catchy address for your new Web site.

Name That Domain

Creative entrepreneurs use marketing savvy, geography, and a little imagination to get great Web addresses. It is important to choose a domain name that closely resembles that wish you are planning to do. Try not to make use of wild characters in your domain name. The name must be easy to remember.

How Secure Is Your Domain Name?

Security is very, very important and cannot be stressed enough. Make sure that your passwords are kept in a safe place, and never give it out to someone else. Try to change it as frequently as possible.

Get a Life — Buy a Domain Name

Don’t be wooed by free domain names. Seeing as this is going to be your business, you need to buy a domain name. It is registered in your name, and all your e-mail addresses are set up with that domain name. For instance if you business is called startup.co.za, people will find it strange that you e-mails come from startup@lantis.net. It would just look much more professional if it was admin@startup.co.za.

Web Hosting

Don’t trust your new site to just any Web host.

Penny-Wise, Site-Foolish

If I could get a rand for each person asking me where they can find the cheapest host, I would have been stinking rich. Get a good hoster, no, get the best. Even if it costs more that the guy at the corner, it will be better.

Four Web-Host Warning Signs

Here are some of the most common indications a Web host is in danger of folding:

• Lack of Support. One of the surest and most easily observed signs of difficulty is a lack of customer support. If your Webhost fails to respond to your calls, if you e-mail your host for support and get no response for several days, or if you’re deluged with auto-responses, you have reason to be suspicious.
  The company might have laid off crucial support staff, which could indicate financial difficulties. This does not bode well for the Web host’s future — or for the future of your Web site, for that matter.
  Try e-mailing your Web host’s customer support department at routine intervals.
  Try telephoning technical or billing support to see how hard it is to reach a human operator, which is often your best means of problem resolution. One school of thought says the better the support, the more stable the Web host.
• Profitability. Ifyour Web host is a public company, find out if it’s turning a profit. If not, be prepared to change Web hosts.
  In the case of private hosting companies, it can be harder to determine whether the company is profitable. Generally, if your Web host offers hosting for what seems to be an exceedingly low price — lower than around R20 per month — you might want to ask yourself how the company can turn a profit with such low rates. Decide if you feel comfortable with the prospective performance of such a company in the long term.
• Media attention. Reading business publications that might mention your Web host is always a good idea. If your Web host is mentioned in apositive way, great. If an article reports layoffs, changes in management, or a company buyout, be aware such changes often– though certainly not always — result in decreased support for the client.
  If your Web host changes hands, this does not necessarily mean you will want to find a new Web host, but be sure to investigate what policy changes might accompany the change in ownership.
• Decreased services. Withdrawal of certain services your host formerly provided might indicate its attempt to reduce recent financial losses. Also research any price increases the company institutes.
  Naturally, businesses must increase prices from time to time, and this is not always cause for alarm. However, if price increases or service decreases are implemented in a way that is less than upfront, the company might be trying to avoid openly disclosing changes that are attempts to salvage an ailing business.

Are You Dedicated to Your Web Site?

Perhaps you’re wondering what a dedicated server is and whether you need one. Here are some guidelines to help you decide.

Security

Shared hosting is not as secure as dedicated hosting. If the security of another site on the server is breached, your site could be affected.

A dedicated server can provide a firewall for which you control all password access. If you store highly sensitive information on your server, this increased security will be a high priority.

Shared hosting gives you a chance to test the waters when you’re just starting out. But as your business grows and your site evolves to include more complicated features, such as e-commerce functions, a dedicated host makes more sense.

Site Design

Attract users with a simple, straightforward site that doesn’t keep them guessing.

Hiring a Web Designer:

If you don’t have the knowledge of webdesigning, put your idea on a piece of paper and pay someone to do the hard work. Just make sure they know exactly what you want. Keep on top off everything so that you can make changes as they go along. Ask to see a portfolio of work that they have done and referrals.

The Price of Ignorance

There is no golden rule about how much you would or should pay. In South Africa prices are between R500 - R1000 per page. It depends on complexity.

Duh-sign of the Times

Web design isn’t about flashy graphics and features. The best sites appreciate the value of simplicity.

Design Your Site for Your Users

If you want to maximize the Web’s power to recruit new customers to your business, you’d better have a crackerjack site. Here are some practical pointers for creating one.

A well-designed Web site can ensure the prosperity of your online business. A poorly designed site can put you out of business. It’s like the difference between showing up at an elegant dinner party in plaid Bermuda shorts and arriving in a tuxedo that’s just a little more nicely tailored than everyone else’s.

Web site design is very different from Web page design. Designing a Web page is a lot like creating a page in a publication or a screen for a computer program. Designing a Web site is like simultaneously creating a new storefront, promotions group and computer department.

A complex project such as creating a Web site can benefit from a disciplined, systematic approach. Obviously, this process will vary depending upon your company, your staff, and your goals.

Assemble a good team
First, get a representative from each of the functional areas of your business - sales, marketing, production, operations, etc. (obviously, if you are a one-person shop, this is easy). Then assess whether your existing staff can fill any or all of the following site development roles:

• The producer articulates the vision of the site and oversees itsimplementation. This person often also serves as the site’s information architect - making sure that the site organization, interface design,navigation tools, interactive components and other big-picture design elements all work together.
• The project manager coordinates the team effort - tracking schedules, budgets, etc., and generally doing what it takes to keep the project on track.
• The graphic designer makes the site look good with nicely laid-out pages and appealing (but low-bandwidth) images. He or she may also do the actual production of the HTML pages.
• The programmer makes the functionality of the site happen - writing HTML, Java Script, CGI scripts, etc., and possibly designing and administering databases. Many small businesses use off-the-shelf software for their storefronts,discussion forums, and other functions, but even they may need programming help to integrate the site’s various programs.
• Writers, editors, graphic artists and other creative talent fill up the site with the words and pictures (and possibly sound, animations, etc.) that inform your customers of what you have to sell and why you are so worthy of their business.

Especially for a small-business site, these roles may overlap. The producer might also create the content, and the programmer might also do the page layout and graphics.

Depending upon your line of work, you may also end up with staff from functional areas filling some (or all) of the site creation roles. If this is the case, make sure that the needs of other functional groups aren’t overlooked.

Five Home-Page Essentials

Make your home page do what you intended it to do — earn money, build community, and disseminate information.

We’ve noticed a disturbing trend in home page design: information overload.

Web designers and developers seem to have resolved the ” to click or toscroll?” controversy in favor of loading everything onto the home page.

” More and more and more is better,” they seem to be saying.

But to our mind, home page overload creates more problems than it solves.

When there’s too much information on the home page, users can’t process it.It’s similar to driving down the highway — the real one, not the informationone — and being inundated by so many billboards that you miss the one signyou’re looking for.

Are Your Visitors Clicked Off?

We understand how home page overload happens. An e-commerce developer wantsto use the home page to announce every product the company sells. Or duelingdepartments within a company fight for home page real estate. Andadvertisements need space, because they produce revenue.

It’s often easier to put everything on the home page than to make tougheditorial choices.

Overloading the home page might quiet your colleagues, but it’s a disserviceto your site visitors. They have the frustrating task of sorting through andprocessing the information. And, as we all know, frustrated site visitors don’tstick around to figure things out; they simply click off overloaded home pages.

To make your home page do what you intended it to do — earn money, buildcommunity and disseminate information — be sure it answers these five,essential questions.

Who Are You?

First, tell visitors who you are. If you’re a household name, such asCoca-Cola, your logo might be all you need. If not, you need a headline or astatement that says what you’re about.

As you write this important identifying statement, keep your visitors inmind. Don’t post your mission statement: ” Our goal is to optimize ourrelationships with customers … ”

Instead, write a concise, user-focused phrase. For example: Driving traffic to your website.

How Is Information Organized?

The home page should indicate how you’ve organized or structured your site.And the site structure should be obvious and logical.

Is the site ordered by product or by service? By department or by region?Users must be able to use the home page to predict where to find answers totheir questions. If their first attempt doesn’t yield pay dirt, they might nottry again.

Think of a home page as the table of contents in a magazine — organized,annotated and enticing. Magazine content is organized by departments: featurearticles, short tidbits, columns and letters. A short blurb describes each itemand provides a hook, a reason for the reader to turn pages.

A home page has a similar function. Its purpose is to provide a logicalstructure for the information the site contains, preview the information, andgive the user a reason to click or scroll for more.

What’s New, Hot or Timely?

The site for the Alzheimer’s Association provides an easy and logical structure. Its uncluttered home page structuresinformation by user groups, for example, people with Alzheimer’s, caregivers,physicians, researchers.

The home page is the right place to tell users about sales, new products orWeb site updates. Time-sensitive information — contests or product offers andbreaking news — deserve space on the home page. You want visitors to come backfrequently, so the home page should tell them what’s changed since their lastvisit.

What Can Visitors Do at Your Site?

Remember that Web sites promote interaction.

Your home page should give users a way to interact: signing up for anewsletter, entering a contest, or participating in a poll, quiz or chat.

Even better, some home pages allow users to personalize the interaction. Areturn visitor to Amazon.com can click on a personalized list of recommendedbooks. At the CNN site, you can personalize your home page so local weatherreports, movie listings and stock quotes for your portfolio are available eachtime you sign on.

How Can Visitors Get Help?

Don’t make users go on a scavenger hunt to find out how to contact you.

Place contact information or a button that leads to complete contactinformation on the home page. Complete information includes e-mail, telephone,fax, street address and the name of a person who will answer questions.

The Web is about customer service. If you don’t want to hear from users or answer their questions fully and promptly, don’t put up a Web site.

Next we will be looking at promotion of your site.