Business Planning for Online Business

The business plan is your primary document for developing a new business, whether it is a completely new enterprise or just an offshoot of an exiting firm. The business plan defines:

1. What the business is (the description)
2. How it will be promoted (the marketing plan)
3. How it will be financed (the finance plan), and
4. How it will be operated (the management plan)
   

How Do I Put My Business Online?

After being convinced of the opportunities presented by the Internet, the first question a business owner typically asks "how do I put my business on-line?" That can't be answered until you answer the question "what do you intend to do on-line?"

In other words, you must know what you intend to accomplish on-line before you decide how to go there. Here are three possible scenarios and how you could accomplish them:

Scenario 1:

I want a web site to promote my company, offer some product information, and provide a means for customers to get in touch with me.

In this case, your options are many and inexpensive. Your Internet Service Provider (ISP) probably offers enough free space for you to develop and post your own web site complete with literature, graphics, and an email link to your personal address. The major ISPs offer no-cost assistance in designing and posting your site and provide a limited choice of features, such as hit counters (which let you know how many times your page has been accessed) and feedback forms.

If you need more than your local ISP can afford, you may wish to look for a basic business hosting service. Most of the business hosting services offer a number of service levels starting as low as $50 per month. In addition to the services offered by your local ISP, you should be able to receive:

1. More space than your ISP provides
2. Assistance in registering a domain name.
3. More comprehensive auditing of your web site activity, including which pages are accessed the most, and some basic information about who is looking at your site and how many different people are looking at your site, as opposed to just how many accesses occur
4. The ability to manage a mailing list from your site, which could be used to send out an email newsletter
5. The ability to offer 'bulletin board' or other asynchronous discussion forums
6. The ability to offer real-time 'chat room' services
   

Scenario 2:

In addition to the above, I want to be able to take credit card orders for products on-line. This is the heart of what most businesses want to do. In order to conduct business on-line, you will need to find a hosting service that supports the use of some form of secure transaction. The most popular system is some form of 'shopping cart' software and the use of a secure transaction software which will allow you to take credit card numbers. Of course, you will also need a merchant credit card account in order to take such orders, just like any store.

Your choices boil down to two; a stand-alone web site or membership in some form of electronic mall (also referred to as a cybermall or e-mall). Within each of these, your choices range from free to quite expensive. Just remember that in the world or cyberbusiness, just like in real life, you often get what you pay for.

Scenario 3:

Business-to-business utilizing electronic data interchange or similar technology. If you are strictly a supply-chain player selling into a specific industry or to a single purchaser, you may be encouraged or, in some cases, required to use specialized hardware and software with which to conduct business transactions, including order response, invoicing, and other transactions. In this case, your customer will probably define the required hardware, software, and performance standards.

The bad news is that more and more supply chains are using this technology as a filter to reduce the number of vendors with which they have to deal. The good news is that the technology is getting more and more affordable and those who take advantage of it will have a competitive edge over those who are slow to adapt.

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