Want To Build An Income Online? Market A Service To Businesses – by Kevin Nunley

Posted by Mark B on October 29, 2009 under Marks Blog Posts | Be the First to Comment

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?”

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.

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.

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.

About The Author

Kevin Nunley

Puzzled about earning a profit on the Internet? Get your FREE subscription
to Kevin Nunley’s e-zine “DrNunley’s Marketing Tips” at http://DrNunley.com.
Kevin has been helping people just like you make money online since 1996 with
copywriting, promotion packages, and marketing advice. Reach Kevin at kevin@drnunley.com.