The store that I’m reviewing today is Scarfu.com, an indie clothing store that is run by someone who I will refer to as P in this article. P initially contacted me through email with the following dilemma.
I just wanted to let you know that your blog has been a tremendous resource for me. I just began my online business selling indie womens clothing at www.scarfu.com. The site has only been live for about 2 months but a few more months have gone into the preparation before we launched.

Much like your online store, my store is run by my boyfriend and I and we both hold full time jobs while working on the website at night. It’s been very time consuming and frustrating, especially when sales are very slow at the moment.

I want to thank you for your blog because I find a lot of useful and relevant information and …

[Continue Reading...]

Starting and running a successful small business does not require intellect so much as it requires common sense and perseverance. Don’t get me wrong, starting a business is hard but the reason most people fail is not because they aren’t smart enough but because they don’t follow through or they get distracted and give up when they don’t see immediate results. We live in a world of instant gratification but starting a business online is almost never instantly gratifying from a monetary perspective.

Photo by Timetrax23

The truth is that the mentality of starting and running an online business is a lot like going on a diet. It’s tempting to go after the latest fad with the promise of quick results with very little effort. If you stop and think about it, there’s always some new fangled weight loss scheme floating around.

“Don’t eat carbs!”
“Drink 6 …

[Continue Reading...]

This is a guest post by Tyler Wells who is a certified public accountant. For all of you who don’t know Tyler, he’s an unrepentant nerd for numbers with a passion for accounting, finance, and small business. Tyler’s love for entrepreneurialism took root while working on his family’s exotic animal farm and blossomed while advising entrepreneurs as a Peace Corps volunteer in Guatemala. Currently he is building an entrepreneurial practice as a Certified Public Accountant and blogs at WebBizFinance.com.

Choosing an accountant is a bit like choosing a life partner, it can be too easy to rush into a relationship, make a choice for all the wrong reasons, and once you’ve finally realized that you made a mistake, find out changing can be a real headache, not to mention expensive. Well, it’s not totally like a romantic relationship because at least accountants don’t …

[Continue Reading...]

I’ve been receiving requests lately to critique some of my readers’ online stores so I thought that it would be interesting to post some of my comments online for others to read. If there is interest, I may make this an ongoing section on my blog. Unfortunately I will not be able to feature all of your sites on the blog but I will definitely answer all of your emails.

The store that I’m reviewing today is www.finebuddhastatues.com, an online store that is run by someone who I’ll refer to in this article as E. The webmaster for this site initially asked me the following questions.

Dear Steve,
I’ve been following your blog for almost a year now and I really enjoy reading your blog posts. The resources that you have on this site are tremendously helpful – thank you very much for sharing them with us.

The reason …

[Continue Reading...]

Marketing your online business and attracting customers to your ecommerce store or sales page is much harder than marketing a blog or any other type of website. Why? It’s because no one really cares about your business. Nobody really wants to know what you have to sell and no one likes being led to a sales page. Even if you think you’re offering the most magnificent products ever, by default people are going to ignore you unless they know who you are.

Photo by RBarney.com

People Hate Sales Pages On Social Media
Marketing your business on social media is all the rage right now but simply posting your online store URL on Twitter or Facebook is not going to get you customers. For one thing, most people are extremely suspicious of any type of sales page they encounter. Anything that even resembles a …

[Continue Reading...]

This is a guest post by Alban who is a personal finance writer. He offers information on how to effectively use a credit card and helps people to compare credit cards online.

Owning a small business is a big responsibility as you have to take care of your clients, provide them with the best service and manage your business success for the sake of your employees as well. However, having a small business credit card is an even bigger responsibility because business credit card spending can quickly get out of control, and instead of making your bookkeeping easier to manage, your business credit card could turn your business dream into a nightmare.

Instead, maximize the use of your small business credit card by understanding when and when not to use it, and follow these top three tips for small business owners using credit cards in their business.
How to use …

[Continue Reading...]

It’s been a while since I’ve written about product sourcing, but I’ve gotten several questions lately on how to deal with new vendors so I thought I’d devote another post about the topic. Picture this scenario… You’ve put together a list of potential vendors that you want to work with either from a tradeshow or from a manufacturer’s distributor list. You’ve never purchased in bulk before. You don’t even have your online storefront up yet and as a result you are extremely apprehensive about contacting your vendors for the very first time.

Photo By Youssef Hanna

Don’t be shy! Unfortunately, you can never be sure what to expect when calling a vendor for the first time. Are your order quantities going to be too small? Are their prices going to be too high? Are they going to give you the time of …

[Continue Reading...]

One of the main points I emphasize at MyWifeQuitHerJob.com is that you really need to be your own boss or start your own side business in order to build wealth at the fastest possible rate. Sure, you can increase your nest egg by simply saving your money and spending less, but realize that being frugal can only take you so far on your path to wealth. Our day job salaries simply aren’t enough.

There are many ways to make money outside of having a regular day job and thanks to the web and the internet, we can all find ways to have a side business without risking a lot of money. Every now and then, it’s also useful to take a step back and look at some other people’s perspectives on entrepreneurship. Here’s what the blogosphere is saying about starting your own business and making …

[Continue Reading...]