6 Classic Business Mistakes That Can Collapse Your Business

Many people want to be their own boss and run their own online business, but most of them fail very quickly. I’ve been there too, my friend. Even though now I run multiple online businesses, one of which makes over a million dollars a year I have to admit that I wasn’t always so self-assured and confident about my business prowess.  I had a lot of challenging times running my first online business; cash flow issues, my budget was never big enough, not all of my marketing efforts made money…but there are valuable lessons in every mistake I made.

The mistakes I made I was able to overcome because I learned from them. When I made a mistake I did not repeat it again. Over time I made less and less mistakes and my profits began to soar. In fact it only took me less than five years to start grossing over a million dollars a year in business. If you’re not getting results from your online marketing efforts or your profits aren’t where you hoped they would be, maybe one of these six classic mistakes is to blame.

Your online ads send customers to your homepage, not product specific pages.

Eeek if this is you, no wonder you’re not making the kind of money you want to. This mistake will cost you customers and a boatload of cash. It’s a common enough error among newbies. Veteran marketers know that customers who shop online don’t go looking for a company to buy from (at least not initially). Instead, when a person shops online they search for something specific, such as “Coach hand bag.” If you sell Coach hand bags and a customer clicks on your online ad it had better take them to product page that sells exactly that. If your link takes them to your homepage or a page depicting a hundred types of handbags made by all different designers they’ll quickly hit the back button and try another site. Always make sure your online ads take customer directly to the product page they searched for. You’ll see your ads conversions rates improve as well as your profits.

Not having a sign up box on every page.

Every internet marketer worth his salt advises his clients to do this, those that don’t regret it. Most times customers don’t find your home page first, they find a product page or blog post first. They may look around those pages but ultimately decide your offer isn’t right for them, while still really liking your site and content. They’ll tell themselves they’ll visit your site another time to check back for other offers. If you don’t capture their email address they’ll forget about you as soon as they click away from your site. Make it easy for them to hear from you again by putting a sign up box on every page. You’ll see your customer base increase tremendously and your profits won’t be far behind.

You don’t use your own hosting.

In the early days of starting your online business it’s common to set up a blog using a free hosting service like Blogger or WordPress. It’s a great way to keep costs down and test your business idea before jumping in with both feet. The trouble is customers see internet businesses with domains that end in blogspot.com or wordpress.com as unprofessional and untrustworthy. It’s the same level of unprofessionalness as someone who tries to sell clothing out of their house or the trunk of their car. The deals may be good, but the shadiness factor ultimately stops them from buying from you. Get off on the right foot with your customers by buying your own domain. The good thing is it’s not at all expensive to do. You can buy a domain name for around $10 a year. If you don’t invest in your own company, you ensure customers won’t as well.

Undercharging for services or products.

Newbies tend to have a really hard time figuring out how to price their products and services. Most tend to underprice because they don’t value their time or efforts enough. Recently I worked with a voice over guy for a new product. He charged me a really low fee and I was excited to have found a new vendor to work with. But half way through the project he emailed me to say he needed to make more money. I found his demands to be extremely annoying and unprofessional. Suffice to say I didn’t use him again-or pay him more money. If he had gotten it right the first time, and priced his services appropriately he probably would have gained a repeat customer and made a good profit off of me. Always make sure you know how much money you need to cover your costs plus make a profit on any service or product you sell.

Teaching something you haven’t learned yet.

I see it all the time, websites that post information on getting traffic, but only get a handful of visitors a month to their own site. Or websites that try to teach others how to make money online that don’t turn a profit themselves. It’s ridiculous. When online businesses blog about subjects they have little to no expertise on, it shows. Their information is vague, they don’t use examples in their writing and their posts tend to be information that can be easily found on other sites. Don’t make this mistake. You won’t gain customers and your lack of passion will show through your posts. Focus on subjects you know and have a real affinity for. Not only will you be happier writing and working on it, but your natural expertise will shine through. As word gets around about your expertise the money will follow.

Not focusing on content.

I am a big believer in providing quality content for my customers. It drives people to my site continually and repetitively which allows me to make money from advertising and product sales. Don’t get me wrong, marketing is important too, but no amount of marketing can turn bad content into a best seller. You might make some initial sales with a bad product that has good marketing behind it, but your refunds will kill you. Save yourself time and money by posting informative, high-quality content to your site and do it as often as possible. The more interesting your content is, the more your profits will soar.

I hope you take my advice and avoid these classic mistakes. If you do you should be ahead of 90 percent of other newbie’s out there. Not only will your business be one of the few that makes it, but you’ll also turn a profit faster and larger than your competitors.

Good luck!

Ethan Warrick


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