Are you new to the internet business world and don't know where to start and how to start a business online. Don't worry this little guide will help you to get over that initial hesitation. Starting a business online requires your commitment. Newbies do it better by following these steps.

The biggest hurdle the newbies are facing, is the limited resource and definitely the biggest question before you will be, whether you can succeed with this limited resource and money. Yes you can provided you have the will to succeed.

First choose your field of interest and judge for yourself whether you have any quality product or service of your own to supply to the field of your interest. Then select a domain name (your website name), reflecting your field of choice with keywords in it. Having a domain name with the keywords is the first in starting a business. If you want to start a domain to sell toys then the keyword is 'toy'. But add one or two words to the main keyword toy to avoid over competition and to create a niche field for you. For example you can have the keywords as 'soft-toys'. Combining 2 or 3 words is called keyword phrase.

If you are not having a product of your own, then you can go for 'affiliate marketing'. Affiliate marketing is nothing but selling other people's products and you will be paid for referral every time a sale is closed. You can operate your affiliate internet business with a website or without a website. But your percentage of success will be higher and you have many advantages in having your own website. Acquiring a domain name and hosting it will not cost you too much. Choose the correct source and don't waste your money repeatedly by going after cheap slogans. Those who are analyzing are the newbies do it better.

The second challenge is the promotions of your website with your limited resource and limited knowledge on how to get website traffic. Having a good looking and informative website but no traffic means no result and no profit. You should present your internet business to the online community. You need to know the most effective and at the same time not very costly methods of driving your website traffic.

Spread the message through word of mouth advertisement

Tell your friends, relatives and your spear of influence that you have created a website. These people are your potential customers and realize that they have their own circle of influence.

Make a list and inform them that you have started your internet business. Unlike olden days, it is easy to spread message today. Phone them, email them and chatting is a very effective way as you will be having a live interaction.

This costs you nothing and this is the best method in driving your first line of website traffic. Write your email professionally and put signature containing the details about your internet business.

Index your website in search engines and web directories

Submitting your website to the search engines is free and you can do it manually. Some companies offer auto submission for a cost, but some search engines will reject auto submission. It is not difficult to submit it manually and most search engines welcome it. Place keyword rich contents so that search engines can crawl your site easily. Likewise submitting to the web directories can be dome manually and some directories charge for listing and again in most cases it is free. They will demand a back link from your site to theirs to provide the free service.

Writing articles to drive website traffic

Writing articles and submitting them to the article directories is another way of bringing traffic. Here also put your signature or your short biography, containing your internet business details together with your a link to your website, at the end of the article or at the resource box provided by the directories. This way you can be easily indexed in the major search engines in a shorter period. When the search engines crawl the directories on regular basis your site will be automatically indexed as you have put your signature there.

Getting Links

Some search engines rank your site by the numbers of links your site is getting from other sites. Try to get links from similar sites in your niche market. There are link exchange programs and auto link creation software. Make sure that your getting back links from the sites for which you have given link from your site. This is called two way link. But getting one way link from other sites will give weightage in your rankings. But take caution that some search engines will ban your site if overdo anything in a short period.

Participating in discussion boards and forums

There are lot of forums catering to the communities of different niche fields. Select the forums appropriate to your online business and post your opinions and doubts and participate in the discussion boards. Don't forget to leave your signature, i.e. details of yourself and your website with a link to your website. Participating in the forums is one way of bringing traffic, but understand that forums will help you to acquire knowledge and to develop your online business.

Start your newsletter

Publish your own newsletter providing useful information and tips to your visitors. Offer freebies for signing to your newsletter. Use your newsletter or ezine to properly develop a relationship with your visitors so that they will one day turn as your customer. Don't always blast out sales pitch letters.

Success is a learning process. You can't learn everything even before getting started. You can learn only after getting started and by committing mistakes. You can get the article directories and web directories details by searching the web. So take a firm decision to start now. Newbies who are not postpoing things, do it better. Starting a business is not a difficult process, but getting traffic to promote your business is the difficult part. Your desire and commitment alone can give you results. Start a business and do it better.