Once you’ve determined which niche market you’re going to specialize in, then you can create an effective business name based upon the products you sell. And one of the most important key elements to internet marketing success is to implement your most important keywords or keyword phrases into your business name and domain name as well. And both business name and domain name should be the same.

For example, if you were selling books, then it would be best to focus on a niche market within books such as business books, accounting books, computer books, web development books or other book categories as well. And believe it or not, if you were selling business books then the best name for your business would be BestBusinessBooks or BestBusinessBooks.com, seeing that buyers who are looking for the best books on business would type in “best business books” in the search engines to find the best business books online.

And since your business name and domain name would be the same, then your online store would be listed higher on the search results seeing that search engines tend to favor websites which have the main keywords and keyword phrases in the domain name.

If you were selling real estate books for example, which would be a more targeted niche market than business books in general, then the best name for your business would be “BestRealEstateBooks.com”, seeing that someone who wants to succeed in real estate will search for the best real estate books on the market and would type in those keywords to find the best results online. And this is just one reason why using your most important keywords in your business name becomes a major key element for internet business success.

For more information on creating your business name please see “How to Create an Effective Business Name”.

After creating your business name, then your next step will be to register that name with your Secretary of State or Department of Corporations for your state. If you’re starting your business as a sole proprietorship then in most states you can register your business name with your county clerks’ office.

For more information on how to register your business name please see “How to Register Your Business Name”.
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Your wwwdomainname.com should match your business name as well. And in order to achieve internet marketing success then your business name and domain name should include your most important keywords.

You can check domain name availability and register your domain name with GoDaddy.com for less than $12 per year. Or you can register your domain name with whichever web host provider you decide to use to host your web site.

For more information on creating your own domain name, please see “How to Create a Search Engine Optimized Domain Name”.
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When forming your business/company, you will have to choose which legal business entity to use when forming the actual business. And in order to do so, you will need to understand the pros and cons of the 4 main forms of business entities such as sole proprietorships, corporations, partnerships and LLC’s (limited liability companies).

Once you’ve determined which legal business entity to use, then you can proceed to form your business. (NOTE: In most states you can establish your business as a sole proprietorship just by registering your business name).

For more detailed information on forming your business using a legal business structure please see, “How to Choose the Best Legal Business Entity for You”.
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Some counties, cities and states require additional licenses such as business occupational and/or county occupational licenses as well, (if applicable in your county). And to find out which license(s) you’ll need in order to operate your business from home, then you’ll have to contact your local county clerks’ office to see which of these licenses is required in your county, city or state. 

You can contact your county clerks’ office and ask them to send or fax you the form or you can download it from their website. Then fill it out, and fax it or mail it back to them with the appropriate fees.

For more information on obtaining any additional licensing, contact your local county clerks’ office or visit their website online.
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A sales tax license, also known as a sales tax certificate, resellers’ license or tax id allows you to collect sales tax where sales tax is applicable, such as when a sale is made from within your home state, (if your state has a sales tax). Furthermore, distributors will require you to fax them your sales tax license as a form of proof of business registration and tax exemption.

NOTE: Alaska, New Hampshire, Oregon, Delaware and Montana do not issue sales tax licenses since these states don't have a sales tax.

To obtain your sales tax license, you can visit or contact your local IRS office and ask them to send you a sales tax license application. Or, you can download the sales tax application from your states’ IRS website.

For more information on obtaining your sales tax license please see “How to obtain your sales tax license”.
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Although most of your sales will be paid by credit card, some customers such as small businesses, schools and other organizations may want to pay you by check. However, those businesses are not going to write or make those checks payable to your own personal name. Instead they’re going to make those checks payable to your business name. And you can not deposit business checks made out to your business name into your own personal bank account. So for this reason, you’ll need to eventually open up a business bank account in the name of your business.

You can open up a business bank account from within the same bank of where you already have a personal bank account or you can shop around to see which banks offer the best rates and services.

You may be required to present a DBA form (doing business as) to the bank when opening your business bank account. You will also be required to present your sales tax license, fictitious name certificate or corporation documents. Be sure to check and have all documents on hand when opening up your business bank account.
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Select your choice drop-shippers, distributors and get signed up with a few of them. You’ll need one or two distributors for your primary suppliers and a few more distributors for back up as well, especially during the holiday seasons.

You can contact them by phone to request an application or download a dealer application from their website. Fill it out and fax it in along with a copy of your sales tax license. Then you’ll be able to check on product inventory and real time pricing.

For more information on getting signed up with distributors please see “How to Get Signed up with Drop-Shippers, Distributors, Wholesalers”.
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Determine how you’re going to open your online store and then do it. You can use your domain name register to host your web site as every web host provider offers complete ecommerce solutions. You can go with Volusion, Shopify or BigCommerce all of which offer complete online store, ecommerce solutions.

Select a store plan, start your online store and then start adding products. For more information on web hosting and ecommerce solutions please see “Open Your Own Online Store”.
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You’ll need to be able to accept credit cards online as a form of payment. And most web host providers offer merchant accounts and complete payment solutions as well. You can also obtain your own merchant account from Charge.com  and/or use PayPal as a secondary or even primary payment processing solution as well.

For more information on merchant accounts and payment processing please see “All About Merchant Accounts” and “Using PayPal as a Payment Processing Solution”.
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Once you have your online store up and running then it’s time to create traffic in order to produce sales. And by using internet marketing methods such as search engine marketing, text link ads and other internet marketing strategies, you’ll be able to create targeted traffic to your website within a matter of hours. And you can do it yourself for free.

For more detailed information on promoting your website then please see “Marketing Your Online Store”.

Once you’ve created targeted traffic to your web site then it’s just a matter of time before the orders start coming in. And from there on out it’s all about taking and placing orders and running a successful online store business.