In the Fall of 2008, with the recession looming, nine graduating seniors majoring in Business Information Technology at Virginia Tech came together to create a way to help America’s small businesses. Their plan was to synthesize the chaotic, fragmented information about ‘going online’ available to small businesses into a single, easy to digest, full color, step-by-step tutorial guide. To be published twice yearly, in the Spring and Fall, the Online Business Guidebook would provide comprehensive, up-to-date, and valuable information to current and aspiring business owners who wanted to go, and grow, online.
Each chipping in a few dollars, these pioneering students founded The Online Business Guidebook Inc., a not-for-profit 501(c)3 educational charity, whose mission is to provide public education on how to start and grow an online business. In May of 2009, with help from generous sponsors, they launched their first edition, in both hardcopy and e-book format. The response has been phenomenal. Visitors have arrived at their website in droves to download the e-book. Small business counselors and advisors ordered and reordered hard copies.
By October of 2009, readership had climbed to over 40,000 small businesses, small business counselors, business school professors, and students, from coast to coast. Hard copies of the guidebook were available in more than one hundred small business development centers in Virginia, Florida, California, New York, and Texas, via SCORE small business counselors in Virginia, and via entrepreneur development seminars run by Virginia Cooperative Extension in partnership with the Virginia Department of Business Assistance. By the time you read this, Small Business Development Centers in all 50 states will have free copies of the guidebook.
You are encoraged to visit the website at www.businessguidebook.org to find further information about starting and growing your online business, ask questions on the forum, and provide feedback. The most recent edition, like the last, is packed with useful information on how to grow your online business: from shopping cart software, to payment processing, email marketing, pay-per-click advertising, affiliate marketing, and more.
As the internet grew, businesses began to move online, many paying thousands of dollars to custom-develop websites. But the landscape is changing, and you no longer need to hire your own team of programmers to launch a web store. With the wealth of affordable, hosted services becoming available – many with no up-front fees, low monthly fees, or small commission-based fees - it’s now possible to start and grow your own online retail business on a shoestring budget. It is exactly this type of service that is featured in the Online Business Guidebook - the Online Business Guidebook will help you on this fun and rewarding adventure.
Read it, recommend it to a friend...and you can even leave a contribution!
The Online Business Guidebook is available directly at:
http://www.businessguidebook.org/OBG_Spring_2010_v3_2.pdf
The Online Business Guidebook Inc. website is: http://www.businessguidebook.org
