online business strategy

My Online Business Strategy: Niche, Mature, and Conquer What’s Interesting

My online business strategy is simple…

  1. Find something that interests me
  2. Research it like crazy
  3. Make a neat site and let it mature
  4. Swing back around and expand it

I’m not sure what I’d call this but I’ve made a process to it all…

  1. Source and order product (sample)
    1. Terapeak (in-demand, low shipping cost, durable, simple)
    2. Keyword/Market analysis (build customer avatar and strategy)
    3. Order product (sample) and understand it
  2. Test distribution channels (threshold)
    1. Keyword optimization, pictures, logistics/costs, and documentation
    2. Upload (Amazon, eBay, Craiglist)
    3. Promotion (marketplaces)
  3. Source and order products (bulk)
    1. Renegotiate (MOQ)
    2. Organize fulfillment organization/storage
    3. Repackaging & possible branding
  4. Distribution (large scale)
    1. Relist and optimize marketplace listings
    2. Build an ecommerce store (and customer service channel)
    3. Advertising and marketing campaigns (PPC, Organic, Affiliate)
  5. Growth/Maturity/Decline
    1. Growth (extra campaigns, partnerships, workforce)
    2. Maturity (entering a horizontal or vertical market, offloading)
    3. Decline (cut costs, liquidate assets, offload)

This kind of works for information-based businesses, too.

Except, swap a few things around where “product” becomes “topic”. And, anything physical you swap for one of the profitable niche ideas.

Why do I think this would work?

1st: You plant a few “seed” ideas by getting them online quickly so they’ll start ranking and collect enough data to make a better judgment vs gut feeling.

2nd: You generally have an end-goal in mind whether that’s later converting an info-site into a physical store or some other monetization method.

Example of the online business strategy:

I’m kicking around the idea of starting a marketing company in my area. So, I’d create the site, optimize it, and build a couple of initial links. If I start receiving traffic and contacts then I’ll double-down on its content, SEO, and listings.

This wouldn’t take up a lot of my time because setting up a site only takes about 15 – 30 minutes (including the basic pages). I could replicate this for several sites and business ideas — coming back 6/mo later seeing which looks promising.

Make sense?