All Posts

This week we discussed landing page optimization and basic SEO. The landing page is the first impression a potential customer will see of your business. It is important to make sure the landing page gives immediate engagement and value to viewers. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization, which is the process of making your website more likely to show up in a search. A good outline to live by when optimizing your website is to remember that words matter. This includes in des

This week we discussed Return on Investment (ROI) and Optimizing Ad Performance. ROI is how much profit you make from your ads and free product listings compared to how much you spend on them. To calculate ROI, take the revenue (the total income you have earned from you ads and listings), subtract your overall costs (also known as COGS, or cost of goods sold), then divide by your overall costs to get a percentage. The purpose of determining ROI is to tell if the amount you ar

This week we discussed Quality Scores and Google Analytics and Tags. Quality Scores are calculated by the performance of expected clickthrough rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience. It is always good to have a high Quality Score. If you notice your score is lacking, first review the components to determine which area you are struggling in. Based off that answer, the most common ways you can fix you issue is by making your ad more relevant to your keywords, updating

This week went further into creating an Ad for your website. We specifically touched on Responsive Search Ads (RSAs). An RSA is what Google leads for most people to use. It works by having the business give Google a variety of headers and descriptions, then they will match up the best ones based on what the internet knows about the person searching for the website. It is better than a regular Written Ad because it customizes specifically to what is most likely to get the sear

This week we learned about advertising your website on Google Ads. Google ads is the what allows your website to show up when people search specific keywords. There are many things to consider when setting up your ad. Think about your target audience and what locations they will be in, what devices they will use, and what their optimal budget is. There are other things to consider, but these are the main ones. When creating creating the ads, it is important to choose good key

This week we learned about different legal structures, licenses and taxes. There are a lot of different types of legal structures, but the one that works best for my personal situation is a Sole Proprietor. There are pros and cons, but that will come with any type of structure you choose. When it comes to licenses and taxes, it really depends on the type of business you are starting. For a personal marketing business, like the one I am starting, I only need a basic selling/bu

This week we discussed site design and e-commerce. To begin designing your website, consider looking at other sites that have the same marketing style as you to find inspiration. Look for things that you like or dislike about these pages so you know whether those are things you want to include on your page or not. As a general rule of thumb, keep it simple so you do not overwhelm the site’s visitors or distract from the products. At the same time as this, however, be unique e

This week we focused on choosing between the different options for website builders and hosts. A website builder is pretty self-explanatory, it is a site that helps you design your website. A host is a site that gets your website out on the internet for people to access. Many hosts offer website builders and vice versa, but not always. There are a lot of things to consider when comparing them. I focused on subscription prices, simplicity, and management accessibility. There a

The lessons this week focused on suppliers and shipping. Not all online businesses source their own products. In fact, most don’t. It can be stressful and risky to try to buy and store all of your product, so a lot of businesses will buy their products in bulk from another store, then sell it marked up. When deciding where to source your product from, there are a lot of things to consider, like shipping speed, quality, prices, and more. Once products are sourced, you need to

This week was a good introduction to learning about how to start an online business. I’m new to running a business in general on top of said business being online, but I’m excited to learn and see where this goes. This week I learned about choosing business models and products. In most cases, it’s smartest to choose the product first. Once you know what product you will be selling, you can better choose what type of model will best suit your business and then tailor your site

Hello Everyone! This blog will be my personal reflection on my journey to starting and running my own online business. I hope that reading my thoughts and advice will help some other aspiring entrepreneur on their journey as well. Please enjoy.