"Selling What You Make, Online" by Jeremy Pellani page 1

It is indeed a strange paradox that the internet enables me to pursue the “simple life." Fresh out of college my wife and I had dreams of living in the country and living off the land. We bought some land, built a house, and started a garden.

There are few jobs here in upstate New York and many of the ones that are available are not that great. We did not want to spend the rest of our lives working a 40-hour work-week at a job waiting to retire (if we could retire) so we could live the simple life.

I can remember jumping from low-wage job to low-wage job wishing I could work from home. It seemed like an impossible dream; too good to be true. Now, it has been three years since I’ve had an off-farm job.

What follows is the general process we went through when starting and promoting an online business. Because all of our businesses have been selling what we’ve made, that is what I’ll speak to.

We have not become wealthy by doing this, in fact we likely live below the poverty line. The truth is we need less money because we don’t have to drive every day to go to work anymore. We have plenty of time to grow some of our own food and prepare meals from scratch. After all, that is why we moved to the country in the first place.

One of the secrets of our success has been to take small, manageable steps. Before we made any sales, it seemed impossible. I got discouraged a lot and had my share of self-doubt; but, because we persisted and repeatedly took small steps forward, we did succeed.

Not every enterprise we’ve embarked upon has made money (some have lost us some). Through trying at it, we learned what we were doing. In that sense, success can be somewhat inevitable for those who are persistent, adaptable and are willing to see it through.

Choosing the right type product to produce and identifying where you can compete is essential to success. On the internet, everybody is invited to the table. This includes small, home businesses and big business, including global business. If I can imagine a product I want to produce being produced in China or somewhere else with low wages, I know I will probably have a hard time competing and turning a profit. If a product is customized to order, of a high quality, uniquely artistic, needs to be delivered fresh/fast or is only a small niche market that is not worth big businesses’ time it may be a good opportunity. I believe the web is ripe with opportunities for the would-be small-business owner.

Identifying the strengths you can offer to the market is key. It may be a low price because of low overhead, or it may be personal customer service. There are areas where a smaller business can flourish where a large business would have a hard time delivering. Think hard about this as it will set you apart and bring you your share of the market you are competing for.

In order to assess the possible demand for a product, it needs to be understood that the internet is a purpose driven media. This means that most online consumers likely know what they want to buy when they begin typing keywords into a search engine. A quick search on Google, Yahoo, or eBay will give you a good idea of what kind of competition is already out there.

Besides just the search results, you will notice there are ads at the top and the side margins of the results. These are businesses who are paying per click to the search engines in order to appear on the margins of specific searches. In other words, they pay the search engine a set amount for each time a searcher clicks on their ad. More on this later.

The same keywords you just typed to find the product you hope to sell are likely how your future customers will find you. They are like the street your shop will be on. You need to find out whether that street is getting any traffic.

(continued)

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