There are many websites, that give you a very real sense of how small and large our universe is. They do a pretty good job at it too. Then, I stumbled on this site, called the Scale of the Universe.

It provides an awesome slider and lets you visually understand the scale of our universe, from the very small to the very large.

Computer programming (or coding) is one of the largest subject fields in the world. Millions of programmers code away to give you apps for your desktop and mobile. Developing countries have jumped on to this bandwagon years ago to alleviate themselves out of poverty and provide their citizens access to a very robust economy that computer programming holds on to.

In Pakistan, there are 1000s of talented programmers, churning out codes in the wee hours of the night, slowly and surely aiding our economy and in turn their wallets. Is enough being done? No.

Ask any IT/Technology company and the one constant complain you will hear is the lack of quality coders. What is preventing us from becoming world class coders? Why can we educate our students and churn out quality coders in our country, considering how easy it is for us to have access to all the study material (and teachers) that are available today on the Internet?

The problem is not that simple. The root cause as pointed out by many people, is the education system. Our universities and colleges are the first entry point for computer programming and that too is flawed in many ways.

On the high-school level, computer programming is virtually non existent. Barring a few eliter schools, the majority of the high-schools in this country have a curriculum that has an absolute vacuum when it comes to computer programming.

To understand why computer programming is important, and why we need to inculcate coding as part of our curriculum  early on, do watch these videos:

Learn to Code via Code.org (1 Minute version)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVn1TqUfZjc

Learn to Code via Code.org (5 Minute version)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKIu9yen5nc

Learn to Code via Code.org (9 Minute version)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dU1xS07N-FA

There is a vast list of programming languages from which we can choose and code from. Two websites that really are a source of much needed inspiration and perhaps implementation in Pakistan are HackReactor and DevBootcamp – both of these teach people how to code, intense program in as little as 9 to 12 weeks. They are currently offered only in the US, but if someone were to model this in Pakistan, and charge a decent premium, whilst delivering the kind of quality that these two organisations put out, a lot would change.

There are computer training institutes in Pakistan, but they are literally struggling to stay afloat because of the price wars amongst institutes. Add to this, there is the issue of teachers (instructors). The instructors themselves have very little training in true Computer Science curriculum. Most of the graduates become teachers, just to supplement their income. They cut-borrow-paste material from the Internet and try to pass it on as authentic course material, doing a massive injustice to the students who enroll hoping to become quality coders. Most instructors that I have talked to, have very little industry experience, and those that do stand out, have limited time in learning and polishing their skills set. Very, very few instructors are truly shining examples, and these are paid well and retained by the companies they work for.

For a student wanting to learn how to code, the road to self-education can be an information overload. Which course to choose? Which one pays off well? Which one is the correct course to start learning with? What is the true path towards become a quality coder?

The above is Codeeval‘s list of most popular coding languages (for the year 2013).  This list (and the one below) however, should not be taken as the definitive list. There are literally 100s of languages and apps one can learn. There is a huge world of Big Data for which companies are desperately looking for coders. Then there is a surge in the jobs for coders who excel in NoSQL, specifically Apache Cassandra, MongoDB and CouchDB. The list is literally endless, where one graduates from the coding itself to using apps that require you to have a prerequisite of coding, like modifying the Linux Kernel or large distributed computing using Hadoop or Google’s MapReduce.

But, I digress. For most, the 10 or 20 most popular programming languages would be an excellent menu to start from. Choose a language to your liking, and take it from there. If you cannot decide on which language to start with, I would always recommend you get started with HTML. Basic HTML is something you can dive into from Day 1.

Whilst, everyone has a different approach as to which language they choose, you should not be in a hurry to decide. Take your time, learn what each language does, its advantage over the others. Its weak points. The market for it. In simple words, take good 1-2 months (in my opinion) and learn about all the languages in the images here (depicting their popularity).

RedMonk published their Programming Languages Ranking (for January 2013). This is also a decent read (for the slightly advanced) on what is in demand out there (click on image to enlarge)

No matter how you look at it, the languages that are highly popular today are:

• Javascript
• Java
• PHP
• Python
• Ruby
• C#
• C
• C++
• HTML / CSS
• ASP

I hav tried listing below a few resources that I have personally visited and read up on. The amount of resources available on the Internet, are in the millions. If you are looking for expanding your horizon, improving your skills set, perhaps you should seriously look at coding as a gateway to a world that is full of promises. 

References / Study Guides:

• I’d like to start with web-related programming, what should I start with?
• How do you explain the basic terminology of Git in the easiest way?
• What are the best books for learning Python?
• Web Development Tutorial: Learn PHP, MySQL, jQuery, CSS and Java (phpacademy)
• What makes C++ better than Java?
• What should I read and view to become a self-taught software engineer from scratch?
• What the are best sites for learning programming?
• What can I do to improve the quality of my code?
• What language would you recommend a beginner to learn: Java, C or C++?
• In layman’s terms, what are the major programming languages, and what are they used for?
• Why is learning Javascript important for web developers?
• What are some good online tutorials to learn basic HTML and/or CSS?
• Software / Resources to learn Website Design?
• What is the difference between Java and JavaScript?
• What are some good beginner programming projects?
• What websites can help you learn to code?
• What set of programming languages should I enroll my 10 year old son in, who has just started learning HTML/CSS at school, and wants to learn web programming?
• Learning to Program on Quora
• StackOverflow – One of the best resources on the Internet today related to programming. A community driven Q&A website.
• PyPy – a fast, compliant alternative implementation of Python
• What is a good book to learn Objective-C for programming on iOS?
• Mixu’s Node book: A book about using Node.js
• Erlang Programming Language
• Treehouse: Learn to build websites, create iPhone and Android apps, code with Ruby on Rails and PHP
• Clojure: Clojure is a dynamic programming language that targets the Java Virtual Machine. Clojure is a dialect of Lisp, and shares with Lisp the code-as-data philosophy and a powerful macro system. Clojure is predominantly a functional programming language, and features a rich set of immutable, persistent data structures. When mutable state is needed, Clojure offers a software transactional memory system and reactive Agent system that ensure clean, correct, multithreaded designs.
• Code Academy: Learn to code interactively.
• PHP Programming Tutorials and Reference Guide
• CakePHP – A PHP framework that makes building web applications simpler, faster and requires less coding.
• CodeIgniter: Fully baked PHP Framework with a small footprint.
• Phabricator: Open-source collection of web applications which makes it easier to scale software companies. It helps software companies communicate about software effectively. It was created at Facebook.
• LearnStreet – great website to get cracking with learning how to code. A great section in LearnStreet is called Code Garage which is a project playground where you can tinker with existing code.
• Great article on Object Oriented Programming: A Critical Approach by Udemy
• Udemy: Start learning from top instructors (has courses related to non programming as well, but also has a lot of programming courses, paid site, but very economical)
• PHP Academy: Learn via video tutorials on PHP, Javascript, jQuery, CSS, HTML and Java
• Code.org – The online movement to enable everyone to learn how to code
• HackReactor: Learn to Code. 12 weeks intensive course in programming (only available in the US)
• DevBootcamp: Intense apprenticeship for becoming a coder in 9 weeks.
• List of Interactive Programming Websites as seen on Reddit.
• Programr: Build cool stuff, right in your browser
• Google Code University
• P2PU: Learn anything with your peers. Online and totally free
• Khan Academy: One of the best sources for e-learning on the Internet. Has tons of courses on computer programming.
• Learn to Code the Hard Way: Learn Python, C and Ruby the hardway, by coding from Day 1.
• The Next Web: So you want to be a programmer, huh? Here are 27 ways to learn online. (Really good resource, highly recommended)
• List of 32 free online programming/CS courses (MOOCs) with feedback (exams, homework and assignments) as seen on Reddit.

In the past couple of days, my Inbox has been inundated with emails from friends & family asking me about Bitcoins. It seems everyone is interested to know about this digital currency phenomenon that all the rage these days in electronic media. A lot of questions have been asked. Is this a scam? Is it worth buying Bitcoins now? Will the price go up? Shall I invest in Bitcoins? How do I mine Bitcoins? etc.

I decided to write a short blog article on Bitcoins, for anyone to read and understand what Bitcoins are. I have provided a long list of references at the bottom of the article to read more, should you so desire. As with all information / financial advice, please do read and consult with other before investing.

Summary

So here is a summary for wanting to know everything about Bitcoins:

• Bitcoin is a digital currency
• It is abbreviated as BTC
• Just like the old days, when Gold and Silver had to be mined from the mountains and rivers, Bitcoin is also mined, albeit digitally.
• The mining is digital in nature. Don’t wonder too much about it, just think of it as your computer crunching number (that is mining).
• Only so many Bitcoins can be mined and released into the overall Bitcoin ecosystem per day.
• The more computing power that comes in to mine, the more harder it becomes for more Bitcoins to be produced (not an accurate statement, but think of it as a built-in resistance to being duped by large amounts of computing power)
• It has been designed so that there is no single source or headquarters or association that controls it.
• It is Peer-to-Peer in nature. Just like your Bit-torrents. There is no one controlling it.
• The money supply is limited, i.e. there will only be 21 Million Bitcoins minded. No more.
• Because the money supply is limited, no one can just print (or mine) more Bitcoins and introduce inflation.
• No Government, Association, Body, Person, Group, etc. controls Bitcoins.
• Slowly and surely, quite a few websites (businesses) have started accepting Bitcoins as a payment method.
• Bitcoin transactions are guaranteed and non-reversible, i.e. if you pay someone with Bitcoins you cannot reverse the transaction. That money is as good as gone to the other person. This is particularly important for businesses who want to sell products/services without the fear of looming chargebacks.
• There are only four methods of obtaining Bitcoins:
  • Mining
  • Buying (from a Bitcoin Exchange)
  • Selling a Product/Service and someone pays you with Bitcoins
  • Gift – someone gifts you Bitcoins
• You would need a Bitcoin Wallet to get started with Bitcoins.
• Right now a little over 11 Million Bitcoins have been mined (remember, mining ceases when 21 Million Bitcoins have been mined)
• The current market value of these 11 Million Bitcoins is a little more than $1 Billion.
• No one knows for sure who invented Bitcoins. The author’s name is Satoshi Nakamoto. No one knows who he is. Most people believe this is a pseudonym  and there are more people behind the creation of Bitcoin.

Videos

Here are some great introductory videos regarding Bitcoins:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Um63OQz3bjo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhFjfVQK3G8

Wallets

• Bitcoin Wallet Wiki
• Strong Coin
• Choose Your (Bitcoin) Wallet
• Things you need to know about your Wallet
• Bitcoin Magazine: Bitcoin Wallet Options
• Multibit Wallet
• WalletBit
• Blockchain Bitcoin Wallet

Trade / Exchanges

Here are some of the famous exchanges where Bitcoins are traded:

• Mtgox
• BTCe
• Bitstamp
• Bitfloor
• BTCChina

Here is the list of all the exchanges that handle Bitcoin in the world. Here is a brief list of all the exchanges that handle Bitcoin trade as a percentage of market share.

• Coinbase – the simplest way to buy, use, and accept Bitcoin
  
• BitMit – Online Auction Site to Buy/Sell stuff paid with Bitcoins
• SpendBitCoins - Turn your Bitcoins into gift cards from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iTunes and many more
• BitcoinCodes – Get gift codes for services like XBoxLive, PSN or iTunes instantly online

Mining

• Start Bit Coin: Beginners Guide to Mining Bitcoins
• Tech Crunch: How to mine Bitcoins
• Pooled Mining
• Bitcoin Mining
• Introduction to Bitcoin Mining (PDF Book, Free download)
• WeUseCoins: Bitcoin Mining Guide

Bitcoin Article (How to get started)

• LifeHacker: What is Bitcoin and what can I do with it?
• WeUseCoins: How to get started with Bitcoins
• Quora: How does Bitcoin work in layman’s terms?
• Myths about Bitcoins
• BitcoinIntro
• Bitcoin Beginner (PDF Books for Sale, very cheap and very good read)

Organisations / Forums / Portals

• BitCoinTalk (Forum)
• WeUseCoins (Portal)
• BitCoin.org
• Bitcoin Foundation – Not to be mistaken to to be confused as an organisation or any body that owns or rules over Bitcoin. This is just a foundation made by a couple of people involved in Bitcoin.

Bitcoin Inforgraphics

The World of Bitcoin According to Google

External Link:

What are Bitcoins and How Do They Avoid Taxes

How a Bitcoin Transaction Works (Click to Enlarge)

Bitcoin 101

Further Reading

• Bitcoin Wiki
• Tech Crunch: Bitcoins and the end of money
• Guardian: What are they, and how do they work?
• Quora: Do you know anyone who has become a US Dollar Millionaire due to early investing and/or mining in Bitcoin?
• Bitcoin Trading Signals
• The Bitcoin Trader
• BitcoinTalk – New to Bitcoin? Start Here
• Accept Bitcoin on your website with a Widget: Coin Widget
• Bitcoinity (Markets)
• Slate Magazine: Will Bitcoins Make Me Rich?
• Jon Bringhurst: How does bitcoin work?
• BitCoinCharts
• BlockChain.info (Bitcoin Market Statistics)
• Economist: How does Bitcoin work?

I have decided to update the answer I had written below. A lot of people have asked me why PayPal isn’t operating in Pakistan especially after I wrote an Open Letter to David Marcus (President of PayPal), See: Open Letter to David Marcus, President of Paypal by Faisal Khan on Posts

It seems the reasons are not inherently that of country risk, but rather a business case. Though the back-channel (read: unofficial) communication with PayPal I have learned the following:

• The previous President of PayPal Scott Thompson (former Yahoo! CEO) who was also former CEO of PayPal expanded PayPal into a lot of territories/countries.
• Out of the 193 UN recognised countries, PayPal operates in 190 of these countries.
• Whilst it is true PayPal is in all these countries, it must be stress, that it does so with restrictions.
• In its truest sense PayPal operates in 29 countries (the number is a little vague, but +/- 2 countries). These are the countries within which PayPal users can send/receive funds without an issue.
• India is not one of those 29 countries.
• Why PayPal did not include Pakistan as part and parcel of its initial roll-out in the early years? I do not have an answer for that, nor has one been provided to me.
• PayPal has spread itself too thin for a lot of the markets it is in, including India.
• My understanding from talking to a lot of people is that PayPal is now looking at key markets with a revised business plan (or blueprint).
• Once PayPal reevaluates India (for example) with its revised business blueprint and achieves success, PayPal will replicate the model for similar regions (including Pakistan)
• Just to be clear, there is no issue with the banking system and/or existing law at present in Pakistan that prevents PayPal from working here.
• It has also been indicated to me, that country risk is also not the main issue (it might be a periphery issue, but it is not a main issue per se)
• As to the Question: “When?” will PayPal come here. Its anyone’s guess. It would be optimistic to say 2013, but most agree by 2014 something should be in place/play as far as PayPal and Pakistan is concerned.
• There is a business case being developed inside of PayPal. They have their own way of evaluating new markets, and Pakistan would be subjected to the same evaluation.
• To say Pakistan is not on their radar would be incorrect, but then again, Pakistan is not a priority either.
• David Marcus and his team are more involved in improving (read: increasing) business for PayPal in the existing markets (I am told this is one of his primary goals).
• What PayPal will be looking at are some of the important facts and figures about our market. The number of merchants online, the Internet statistics, the average cost of a purchase online, etc. I am hoping to get more information from PayPal as to what specifically they look for when entering new markets.

The above (and below) was my answer on Quora: Why doesn’t PayPal offer its services in Pakistan?

PREVIOUS ANSWER (As of July 2011)

The questions that everyone wants an answer to. I have been writing to PayPal for 10+ years to solicit a reply from them – as to why they are not here in Pakistan (you can read that correspondence on www.faisalkhan.com)

PayPal operates in various countries but a few countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh, (amongst the larger ones) are missing. When countries like Somalia, Yemen and Rwanda are included in the list of countries where PayPal is available, one begins to wonder why Pakistan is not included.

It is not primarily about market size, I am sure Pakistan’s market size is a whole lot larger than many countries (combined) where PayPayl currently operates in.

The issue is country risk. <- I cannot sum it more accurately.

A financial institution like Paypal does risk assessment in their own way to assess which country it should and should not do business with. PK, whilst a large market size (compared to say Sri Lanka or Yemen or Rwanda) still poses a high-risk due to the factors like:

• KYC (Know Your Customer)
• AML (Anti-Money Laundering)
• OFAC (Office of Foreign Assets Control)
• SAR (Suspicious Activity Report)
• Beneficiary Information

The above (IMHO) are the major issues that PayPal faces, not being able to accurately gauge the above, is a risk that PayPal does not want to take.

They, PayPal can be penalized by the  financial regulator in the country they operate FROM (not To), and the risk of account freezing, etc. All these factors they have to weigh against how much money they can earn (and they have a pretty good estimator for this). The risk vs the income – makes them conclude that PK is a risk country as far as business is concerned.

In addition to this, a small group with PayPal is trying to convince their management to look into Pakistan, whilst a large portion of members within the PayPal corporate world are literally biased and oblivious towards Pakistan as well (this is not an empty statement, but the ground reality within PayPal). PayPal itself is not entirely ‘clean or fair’ in its efforts. The ruckus that Pakistan is a money laundering country, etc. fails and pales in comparison to the amount of money laundering done in the US, and Latin America. As with every Pakistan/Indian issue, there are bigoted people within PayPal who are still harboring the animosity towards each other, is also another unsaid reason why Pakistan and Bangladesh have not gotten PayPal.

There is absolutely NO written notification and/or official circular from the US Government or Federal Reserve that ‘prevents’ Pakistan from having PayPal or tells organizations PayPal to discourage the Pakistani market. This myopic stance within PayPal is biased and unfair.

As previously speculated on many forums, it has NOTHING to do with SECP, SBP, FBR, etc. – - – that is not the issue (nor ever was).

A lot many forums and discussion boards have proposed that if PayPal cannot come to Pakistan, we should have our own payment system for the world to accept and adopt.

If you track payment systems, there are currently over 250+ payment system, after discounting the top 10-15 payment system, the rest of them COMBINED together probably do not do more than say #14 or #15 on the list. Having a payment system is one thing, having it adopted and be utilized and accepted by others is another matter entirely — and in some cases the key.

Lets talk about inward micro-payment options (barring PayPal) – you have none. No other micro payment system exists currently other than Paypal (sub $1 payments notwithstanding) that is worth mentioning or worth trading or transacting on. Even if you will make one, do you actually think your buyers in the international arena will adopt it? (I dont think so). Even some famous ones are having issues adopting.

The same can be applied for outward settlement. The fees structure for settling payment outside of Pakistan is quite complex. Daily reporting on transactions, along with the KYC and AML needs to be reported to the PRI division of SBP.

Without having any a priori information on the subject matter, people can comment and propose all they want, but seriously ask your self a question, how many hours? days? week? months? or years? have you applied towards the understanding of various payment systems that exist today? Have you ever spoken to them? Understood the back-office and legal issues, met with them in a seminar, etc.

So proposing that Paypal do this or that — is frivolous, (they are way more informed than you and I – combined).

Also – proposing an alternate payment system – how will that fair, if say tomorrow Google checkout becomes a micro-payment system, or the same were to happen with Twitter, or what many consider the inevitable, that Facebook launches either itself or in partnership with someone else, launches an payment/virtual-currency, that allows cross-border settlement and micro-payments? How will you payment system work.

Also remember, Paypal does not allow external payment system to integrate with them.

I do not mean to stomp the idea, but believe me, I have spent many years reading this all and do not make a statement just on heresay, but one that is based on hard statistics, fact and a whole lot of communication.

We may be #3 or #2 on some freelancing project network site, but what are we processing in terms of real-$-value per day? Do we do $30 Million a month – if not – we’re nothing as far as the financial transaction settlement world is concerned – an average ACH in the US transaction more than the $1 Trillion per day (yes, that’s is correct 1 Trillion, and no its not a typo). US ACHs transact more than $30-$45 Trillion per day, depending on the day of the week.

So, swallow your pride and understand and live with what we have. In the fiscal world as far as income – we are NOTHING. Accept that. In the world of RISK, believe me when I say we are almost #1. If people (rather financial institutions are NOT willing to do business here), then there is nothing you can do about it – Government or No-Government Pressure!

Let me give you an analogous example, please bear with me on the humor. The mangoes export of this country is FAR greater in number ($-wise) than say the inward and outward money combined from freelancing. Yet, the US chooses that we cannot export mangoes to the US, and there is NOTHING we can do about it. This has been true for over 25 years. Now – if we cannot export mangoes to the US, then what comical sense do we bring to the table asking Paypal to come here, because we are #2 or #3 on some work portal.

Update
As an update, the government of Pakistan has constituted a committee recently to look into the issue of Paypal. This is being reviewed under the umbrella of State Bank of Pakistan. It is still in its nacent stages, but nonetheless, it is being looked at, which is a positive step. The goal here is to connect with PayPal and inquire officially what are the hurdles that prevents them from entering this market, and if possible, SBP will see if they can address them (if it is under their purview).

If the Earth were 100 pixels wide, how far out would the Moon be? How far out would Mars be? To answer this question, someone did a fantastic job and created the How Far is it to Mars? project. This is an exact, scaled representation of how far away Mars is from Earth. Its automatic (interactive) and worth the 5 minutes of your time.

Here is a list of cool tools & apps for you to make your Resume look more appealing visually by transforming it into an Infographic. . Please wait while List.ly populates the list.

Every time I sit in front of my computer, I am itching to start something new. An idea. Implement it. Sell it. I see the Internet as a gateway to opportunities, so imagine my surprise when people say they’ve gotten bored by the Web/Internet. There are a million things you can do online, and starting an online business happens to be one of my favorite pastimes. I don’t start online business myself anymore, I do however, now advice quite a few people on a pro bono basis on how to get started online, and help their idea get off the ground.

“So how do I start an online business?”  This question gets asked of me. A lot.

From budding entrepreneurs, to the unemployed, from students to housewives, from the elderly to the very young. Those who want to have their own thing on the side or to have their own business. What to do? How do I start? Where do I seek help? What are the steps? Where do I go? What do I need to learn? How much money would I need?

You’ve been thinking about all these questions for month or years, but have never really gotten to finding answers.

As a starting point, I want to make you aware of a very moving Quote. If you don’t understand this quote, you might as well skip this article and go back to whatever you were doing.

The right time is Now. Not tomorrow, not next week. Its now! What you put off today, will only prolong the situation, not improve upon it.

Over the course of my career, I have come across literally 1000s of people who seek advice on how to start their own business. They have ideas, dreams, ambition yet they lack the inertia to take the first step or maybe they are just clueless about it.

As the famous Chinese philosopher Laozi said: A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

So here’s are the first steps.

Starting an online business if not difficult at all. Its just a series of steps that need to be executed successfully that will have you owning an online business in no time. I would like to clarify one thing here. This article does not cover affiliate marketing, something which I absolutely am odds with. To read up on why I think there is no money in affiliate marketing, click here.

BUSINESS PLAN (Yes, Argh!)

Have a Business Plan? No? Then you need one. To start with an online business, you first need to decide what type of business you want to enter into. When choosing what type of business, you must take into consideration your knowledge and know-how of that particular business. It is equally important that you are cognizant of the geographic area you would be operating out of and the geographic regions that you would be selling to.

Let us say, your forte lies in clothing and fashion niches. Now it might or might not be foolhardy for you to venture into the online world of software sales. You might just get lucky at it, but the probability of you failing in that specific niche, is quite high. Why? It has quite a lot of do with domain knowledge.

Important Note: Stick to something you know or are passionate about.

A business plan gives you not only the holistic view of what you are trying to do, but also puts things into perspective for you. The Harvard Business School has a great resource section to help you make a business plan.  Here are some other free/paid resources you can also reach out to regarding your business plan:

• Bplans – an online paid website that allows you to choose from 100s of business plans and allows you to write your business plan online.
• Microsoft Word Templates – You can search through this resource for “business plan” templates.
• Score.org – Business planning templates.
• US Small Business Administration – Online business plans.
• Inc. Magazine – Artemis Free Business Plan Template.
• BizGym – All in one (paid) business planning and pitch development website.

A well-researched and thought out business plan, will make you more acutely aware of the competition, the opportunity that exists, the pluses and minuses of the industry, and more importantly, what is your unique selling point. What makes you so inherently different that buyers will flock to your website for the products/services you sell?

All this added clarity is only due to a business plan and all without investing a time in the business. As much knowledgeable you may be in the field, a business plan also serves a dual purposes – it also acts as a sales pitch book. You, yourself, would be your best critic and have answers to all the questions a ‘devil’s advocate’ may ask.

If your financials are correct, you will know very clearly, about what your expenses will be, and what it will cost you to run this business.

You wouldn’t buy land without having it properly appraised and thought over it a 1000 times before constructing your house. You look at 100s of factors, the neighborhood, the location, the locale, the commute factors, the town itself, taxes, schools, job opportunities, etc.

Your online pursuit, should be no less.

Once you have determined your vertical and niche (for your product &/or service), the next step to naturally ask yourself is where will you source your goods/services from? and for how much?

Some questions to consider are:

1. Is your supply line competitive and reliable enough?
2. What is the competition like?
3. How many competitors show up on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, page of Google? (for your country? worldwide?)
4. Will you be able to compete against these search results and make your way into these search engine results pages?
5. How many of your competitors are buying ads? What is the average price they are paying per click? Will you be able to compete with them?
6. Average selling price?
7. What is your unique selling point? (free shipment, extras? discounts?, etc.)
8. Whatever you are selling, is it cyclical in nature?
9. Does your market scale horizontally or vertically?
10. You need to invest in inventory? If so, how much does that cost?
11. You may also need to look into Affiliate Marketing and Drop Shippers. These two options also represent a great way to start without having to worry about any sales process. You simply divert the user to the sale mechanism of the company whom you are representing for affiliate marketing or drop shipment and al is usually taken care by them. Referral sales are how 1000s of businesses today are doing business on the web. [but I digress]. Affiliate Marketing in my opinion will bring you traffic, but hardly any sales. With Millions of affiliate program out there, I would recommend you stay focused on your business plan and marketing it in the traditional way.

All these answers will come out from a well-researched business plan. Hence, I keep stressing the importance of it. A business plan gives clarity from all perspectives and serves as a cheat sheet and your focus document, should you go astray.

ONLINE SELLING MODEL

The basic Internet Marketing Model (or online business model) is pretty much the same for most businesses.

You can have the best website on the Internet, selling the best product or service, but if you don’t have any visitors to your online shop – you will not be seeing sales anytime soon. We concentrate too much in making our perfect online websites, and completely ignore the need and necessity of visitors (traffic) to make sales.

There is no other way to explain it. The more visitors you have to your website, the more sales you likely to make.  To understand traffic, let us understand our visitors first:

Destined: Those visitors who are destined for your website, i.e. they are typing the URL or click on a link to come to your website.

Transit: These are the type of visitors who use your website to go to another one.

Accidental: These are the type of visitors who did not mean to come to your website.

So now that you understand your visitor types, what sort of traffic types exist?

The Four traffic types are, Organic, Referral, Paid and Direct:

Organic:

• that comes and builds up naturally
• usually involves search engines traffic as well
• comes through relevant linkages
• is slow to build up – takes time
• Google loves organic traffic as it is well-behaved

Referral:

• also Organic in nature
• comes through articles or linkages
• is usually a derivative of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation)
• when optimised - search engines are a major driver of traffic

Paid:

• not Organic at all
• existence is based directly on your ability to pay
• is “keyword” specific
• expensive – but the more sure was to instantly generate traffic for your website
• most preferred / utilised method
• hinged on your ability to go keyword research

Direct:

• again, its Organic in nature
• word of mouth / offline referral / brand-identity
• repeat / bookmarked visitors constitute largest segment
• most internet marketers would not relay on this method alone
• largest contributor  if you have a brand – Apple (you don’t search for Apple, you directly go to www.apple.com)

RISK: MONEY & TIME

Important Note: Whatever money you spend on your online endeavor – you should be able to risk it all. After all that you may do, you may find out that the business never really took off and you want to throw in the towel. Be prepared to lose that money. What will be done with the inventory (if any), are things you need to think of. As in life, I say, there is a 50-50 chance. Either it will work or it won’t. If it doesn’t – and you are ready to call it quits, then understand the gamble to take with your money. Be prepared to lose it all, if worse were to happen.

DOMAIN NAME

To be online, you need a domain name. You can opt for a generic domain name, or a unique domain name. if you are selling Bicycle Seats, your domain can be www.BicycleSeats.com (if you are lucky enough to grab something like this). If you are a multi-product line store, you might opt for something like www.PetersOnlineStore.com or something of that nature (nomenclature notwithstanding).

Do keep in mind, today’s online stores heavily rely on online optimization and marketing. Choose your words for your domain name carefully. SEO is something you will have to consider later on. (SEO = Search Engine Optimization).

HOSTING

Once you have your domain name, you would need hosting. There are plenty (actually 10,000s) of web hosting partners you can go to, and get your web hosting. The most preferred ones are like HostGator, BlueHost, GoDaddy, Verisign, 1and1, LiquidWeb, iWeb, etc.

WEBSITE DEVELOPMENT

Once your hosting aspect has been taken care of, you would most likely need to have a website developed. I am going to assume that this is something you are familiar with and can work around to have this website (your online identity) sourced from somewhere and taken care of.

SHOPPING CART, CONTENT AND CMS

Important Note: If you are going to use a hosted shopping cart, most of the time you would not even need a website developed. If your prime goal is to sell online via the shopping cart, just go ahead with that. The shopping carts mentioned below are good enough to be strapped onto your domain and you get started right away. This only implies if you are okay with a online hosted shopping solution and do not want a website developed.

Three things to consider when doing your website:

1. The content and copywriting is unique and up to par. Content is King. Don’t ever forget that. Your website copy should be error free, grammatically correct and on the dot, meaning, the headlines, the opening sentences, the descriptions, etc. all need to have a proper sales copy feel to it.
2. You have the ability to change the content of the website without a need for a web developer, etc. (a Content Management System) is a must. A good and perhaps the most prevalent CMS out there on the Internet is WordPress, check it out and see on how to get started, or alternatively, read this article on How to Get your Business Online using WordPress.
3. You will most likely need some form of a shopping cart system for your website. Though there are 1000s of free and paid for shopping cart systems out there, my advice to you would be to free your time, outsource it. Opt for a SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) hosted shopping cart app. Of the few (best) shopping cart systems I would recommend are:
   1. Shopify
   2. Magento
   3. Big Commerce
   4. Volusion
   5. Etc.

A good shopping cart system will have plenty of options for your store layout, discounts, coupons, loyalty program, shipping integration, payment handling integration (especially look out for PayPal integration, a lot many users prefer to pay via PayPal), etc.

Unless you are a techie, and really have extra time on your hands, just opt for an online-shop builder solution (also known as hosted shopping carts). There are no steep learning curves, safe and secure (read: hassle-free) hosting and above all, you get technical support. Remember, time-saved is money earned.

Once you have take care of your shopping cart, website, domain and hosting. You are essentially online. However, you still need to process payments.

PAYMENT INTEGRATION

I must point out here, that today’s shopping carts are very advance. The hosted shopping cart solutions like Shopify etc. do not require that you have a separate website all together. In fact the GUI / Design of the shopping cart is such so as to give a fully functioning website look, feel and experience, whilst still having the entire domain of the shopping cart (product categories, checkout, etc.)

The ability to accept online payments, is a straightforward process. You need to have what is called a Merchant Account (usually provided by a bank, based on your credit history, etc.) and then you need to have this Merchant Account – integrated with your shopping cart system. The merchant account is not mandatory. You can tap into various 3PP (Third Party Payment Processors) to do the same for you, however, do note, your acquiring fees would be slightly higher.

Here, luckily you have many options. 1000s of merchant service providers would be able to assist you. From Cardservice International, Authorize.net, 2checkout.com (if you are international or even US concentric), Braintree Payment Solutions (highly recommended), Bank of America, etc.

I would really look at Braintree and see if you can get started with them. Very helpful staff, and very good rates. You need to be aware of:

• The acquiring fees (usually a percentage). The lower the fees, the better it is.
• Monthly fees
• Per approved transaction charge
• Rolling reserve (some merchant opt for this)
• Charge back Fees
• Fraud Control
• Integration with various shopping cart system?
• 24/7 Customer and Technical support

SHIPPING

If you are selling physical goods, it would be a good idea to sign up with say USPS, Fedex, UPS, etc.

Now that your store aspect is almost complete, you would need to take care of a couple of things:

1. Telephone Number and Address for your business (I am going to assume you will be a proper business that is registered)
2. Be aware of what your tax rate is if you are shipping within the state
3. Your terms of sale, terms of service, acceptable usage policy, privacy policy, service level agreement, disclaimer and legal terms all need to be worked out by an attorney. Money spent on this is well worth it.
4. Your refund policy and exchange policy needs to be clearly spelled out.
5. Do make sure your shopping cart can handle refunds, etc.

BOOKKEEPING

For your accounting and bookkeeping, you can again resort to an online solution. Xero.com or Quickbooks.com are two good options.

HELP DESK

You would also need some form of a Customer Support Help Desk, where your users can open support tickets or ask questions, etc. Here again you have many SaaS options like Zendesk.com, 37signals.com, etc. Google for “help desk” or “hosted crm” and you should see plenty of results.

With the above your online store is essentially complete.

WEBSITE TRAFFIC: VISITORS

What you now need to work with, is getting visitors. You have just perhaps spent quite a few weeks in the making your online virtual shop probably the best it is. However, sadly all this goes to waste if you don’t have any visitors to your website (shop). The more (targeted) visitors you have the higher the probability of a sale.

Most online websites that sell fail to see any sales is because they underestimated the importance of post-website construction phase, known as traffic building. Without traffic, there is no sales. Whether you bring in targeted traffic slowly (organically) or via paid clicks, all depends on you, however – this is an area you cannot afford to ignore.

You need to now work with a professional (individual or company) who will work with you, on your limited budget to start online campaign for you. The online campaign is not just for marketing purposes, but it is also geared towards your search engine optimization (SEO). You would be looking at things like acquiring back links, having articles written and placed on various ezine sites, listing your website with the necessary online directories, making sure your site is index properly by Google and other search engines. Make sure you on-page SEO is done correctly. Your META tags and descriptions are well written, etc.

You can also get started with a small online PPC (Pay-Per-Click) campaign on Google, to buy ads and bring (targeted) traffic to your website. PPC is one of the fastest ways to bring visitors to your online store.

Everyday by some estimates 40,000-50,000 blogs/websites, etc. go online. that’s everyday. What is going to make your website stand out is only how effectively people are able to search for the things they want to buy (which presumably you are selling) and how effectively you utilize and conquer (for lack of a better word) the Search Engine Results Page (or SERPs). Don’t ignore the social media either. Today, more and more users can be found spending countless hours on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ (relatively new), LinkedIn, etc. Learn to adapt your marketing and communication by using social media.

In the end, it boils down to two things:

• The end price the user will pay to have the product/service delivered to them.
• The user experience.

It is not easy competing with the likes of the web giants, like Amazon or Ebay, or other web stores (albeit Ebay would classify itself as an Auction). You need to give users a reason to come to your website and shop from your store.

One example of a store done very well in my opinion is www.etsy.com – you will see what a great feeling it juxtaposes on to the visitor.

Hopefully, this would give you a very good starting point on how to get started with your online store. As I cited, I could have overlooked a few key points, please do not hold that against me. If you need any additional information, feel free to post here as a comment and I shall reply. Good luck on your venture.

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