Start Your Own E-Business: Your Step-By-Step Guide to Success

eBusiness supposedly refers to all business processes that take place across electronic networks. I'm not sure this book is really about starting your own ebusiness. It clearly is not a step-by-step guide to success. Instead, it is a wonderful book on just about all aspects a business should consider when establishing an Internet presence. The issues covered are: 1. Should a business sell goods and/or services via a Web site while also doing so through a bricks and mortar storefront? Will one distribution vehicle steal business from the other? Will they complement each other? Is one better than the other? 2. What is involved in putting together a simple Web site yourself? How about paying someone else to put one together for you? 3. The nuts and bolts of Web hosts and domains. 4. Are affiliate programs good? 5. Search engines: their purpose, and how to get indexed by them. 6. Having credit card payment options. There was some coverage of getting your small business financed. Should you go it alone, contact angel investors, or deal with venture capitalists? I thought this material was well presented. I also thought the real world examples and the interviews of people who have been successful with having an Internet presence was great. I've been studying Web sites and online marketing since 1998 when I purchased a copy of Frontpage 98. A lot of what I have learned over the years is covered in this book. Sure, there could have been more written about affiliate programs and other pay-per-click schemes, but at least this book covered the subject. There could have been more about low cost Web hosting solutions, but at least this books covered the subject. And there could have been more about the need to understand graphics programs if you decide to build your own simple Web site. But all in all this was a wonderful book and I highly recommend that small business owners definitely give this one a read. It's getting 5 stars because its content is great.

The fine thing about this book is that it meticulously presented a general overview of starting a conventional business, before delving into its e-business specialty. It harbours valuable information on how to assiduously refine and fine-tune a business idea, before structuring-out a befitting business plan for it. Clear and cogent explanations abound in it. And, the addition of a number of examples, in the form of case-studies, provide its reader with real life scenarios of what embarking on this direction really entails. In addition to analyzing various approaches for getting-up and running in no time, it provided useful insights into the specific requirements of both Business-to-Business and Business-to-Consumer e-commerce. The author of this book used clear and simple terms to explain important start-up issues like: planning, finance, market-entry, publicity, item or service pricing, customer management, general logistics and organization. She also provided useful website-links wherever necessary. I found the chapters of this book quite engaging. All their narrations were straight to the point. They did a plausible job in translating good ideas into comprehensive pieces of information. I am sure that most aspiring e-business entrepreneurs will find it very useful.

I am a marketing major and found this book to be helpful in developing a website for our family business. I think the book is a little misleading because I thought it would not only talk about technical and marketing aspects of e-commerce but explain at least the starting point for coding a website or at least scratch the surface of the actual web design. I also think there could have been fewer interviews and more content. I recommend Website Design Made Easy by Dennis Gaskill aka Boogie Jack if you are really interested and serious about building a good website. He offers great free resources to enhance your site.

I believe the authors did an outstanding job in disseminating the information. What could appear to be a number of complex topics were presented clearly in real word terms and examples. The use of both popular and not popular websites from the present and the past helped me to understand clearly the topics of discussion. I purchased 4 additional copies of this book for members on my development team and since it is full of notes I do not suggest you wait for my copy on any used book list. All kidding aside, it's a Great Read!!!

It has a few to many interviews by people that made it big and not so big. Some are interesting but mostly it takes away space for other good material. The book also points to other good information and overall it is a great place to get started.