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INTRODUCTION: DOTCOM REVISITED  | 1 |
| Shoppers are allotting more of their budget to online shopping. Get ready to catch the next wave! You will learn how to build a profitable business online by adopting good business practices and cost-effective e-business strategies.
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| PART 1: | SUCCESS OR FAILURE, THE CHOICE IS YOURS. | 9 |
| There is no single magic formula for success. You are your own best teacher and your worst enemy. Your attitude, not aptitude, determines your altitude. Everything is possible if you set your mind to do it. You will soon find yourself on the road to success by training your mind to think like a winner.
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| PART 2: | WHAT SHOULD I SELL? | 15 |
| You will have a higher chance of success when you are passionate, committed and motivated to create a career you love. Believe in your idea and make it works!
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| PART 3: | PLAN YOUR WAY TO SUCCESS | 27 |
| You can use the business plan to chart your course so that you can navigate your "ship" safely through the uncharted waters of running your own business. The planning process can be used continuously to develop appropriate strategies to take advantage of the changes in the marketplace.
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| PART 4: | POSITIONING YOUR BUSINESS | 36 |
| To be seen and heard in the overcrowded marketplace, you must use a consumer-focused approach to create a "position" for your business or product in the minds of your target consumers. It is not enough just being the second or third best. You must be the leader in your defined position in order to win the marketing warfare.
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| PART 5: | THE PRODUCT CONCEPT | 45 |
| What is a product? Developing the product concept goes beyond just creating the tangible product. You have to add value to the product with services that help to improve the online shopping experience and build lasting customer relationships.
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| PART 6: | WHERE TO SOURCE FOR PRODUCTS? | 54 |
| Online shoppers are very price sensitive. To compete with established players who enjoy better margins through bulk purchases, you may wish to explore alternative sources of supplies both locally and overseas.
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| PART 7: | E-COMMERCE SOLUTION | 68 |
| You must find an e-commerce solution that lets you build a complete online replica of the entire business operations. This chapter will give you an overview of all the important features required to build and manage your online business effectively.
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| PART 8: | CREDIT RISK MANAGEMENT | 81 |
| E-merchant, beware of online crooks! Credit card fraud risk, like any business risk, can be controlled. You will learn how to use the e-payment system's fraud screening feature and address verification system as well as my proprietary risk management process to screen out online fraud effectively.
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| PART 9: | ORDER FULFILLMENT | 90 |
| The real test for an online business begins when a customer places an order through the Internet. An order fulfillment system must be put in place to ensure that the right products are delivered to the right consumers promptly and in good condition.
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| PART 10: | MAKE YOUR SITE SELLS . . . | 99 |
| Online selling is different! If you want to close more sales, you must use real bargains to attract customers, benefit-driven words to trigger emotion and unbiased customers' testimonials to persuade customers to buy.
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| PART 11: | BUILD A COMMUNITY FIRST | 114 |
| Developing a vibrant online community holds the key to your online business success. Besides serving as a captive market for your business, it helps to improve the online shopping experience, influence buyer's behaviors, build lasting customer relationships, attract new customers and cut down on advertising expenses.
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| PART 12: | PUBLISH A NEWSLETTER | 127 |
| You will learn how to use various tactics to build a highly responsive mailing list and publish a newsletter regularly to keep your prospects posted on the latest promotions and happenings at your e-store. The strategy helps you improve your sales conversion rate and get more mileage with every advertising dollar spent.
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| PART 13: | FREE PUBLICITY | 138 |
| When the media pick up your story, the resulting editorial coverage could be worth millions of dollars in equivalent advertising. There is no other more cost-effective way to generate public awareness and credibility for your business. To increase the chance of having your story published, you must come up with newsworthy stories that appeal to the readers of your target media and present your news release in a format that appeals to the editors.
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| PART 14: | MARKETING ALLIANCE | 148 |
| It is very costly to acquire new customers online. To extend your reach to new markets cost-effectively, you can form strategic alliances with other small businesses, advertise in major online media and recruit thousands of affiliated sales partners.
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| PART 15: | AFFILIATE MARKETING | 160 |
| Affiliate marketing will set the wave for e-commerce. No other marketing programs can reach out to as many affiliated partners as cost-effectively. Many merchants have used affiliate marketing to increase revenues and minimize the costs of acquiring new customers successfully.
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| PART 16: | FREE TRAFFIC | 185 |
| Almost half of all online buyers locate a Web site through the search engines. You can direct this traffic to your site if you manage to secure top placements from the search engines. I will show you how to build a top-notch Web site to improve your ranking while using the latest cloaking technology to jumpstart your Web position immediately.
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| PART 17: | E-BUSINESS MANAGEMENT | 195 |
| Managing an e-business involves a lot of hard work. You can manage the diverse tasks in-house by employing three to four persons. Alternatively, you can retain the merchandising function and hand over the customer service, community development and marketing functions to an e-business partnership set up together with other small businesses.
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| PART 18: | MULTICHANNEL STRATEGY | 204 |
| To improve your profitability, you may have to complement your e-business with a strong presence in either catalog or brick-and-mortar retailing. You will be able to derive operational economies of scale and improve the shopping experience with seamless cross-channel services and marketing activities.
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| EPILOGUE | 213 |
| ABOUT THE AUTHOR | 215 |
| BIBLIOGRAPHY | 217 |
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