Starting Your Own Advertising Business

If you are anything like me then you are positively thrilled that another 200-300 million more people will be hopping online in 2006! Now that puts the total number of users at roughly 1.3 billion by the end of next year. Oh! I can almost smell the opportunities that are being generated day after day! Is it any wonder that millions of people are shucking off the corporate shackles year after year and going into business for themselves using the Internet as their medium? Now you can't just jump into the game if you haven't any relevant skills or experience, but you CAN definitely open up your own online advertising business if you have some marketing or sales experience!

Essential Equipment

Now a huge barrier preventing most people from going into business for themselves is probably obvious to you: money. Now an online advertising business requires little start-up capital because you probably have just about everything you need already! The essential equipment you will need to get your advertising business off the ground is:

• Decent computer, be it laptop or desktop
• High-speed Internet connection
• Cell phone
• Fax machine-perhaps not vital, but very helpful

Even if you had to buy a new computer (and printer) and get a new cell phone to use only for your business, you could still jump into the online advertising game for $2500 or less.

Target Market

So who are your potential customers? Basically, any business out there that needs to sell its products or services and this is not hype or any exaggeration! I will discuss how to reach these businesses a little later and build your client list.

Essential Skills/Experience

As I mentioned earlier, you need to have some prior advertising or sales experience to consider opening your own advertising business. Plus, familiarity with the Internet definitely helps. Finally, you are going to want to do some research on Internet Marketing before jumping into fray as this will be important to you for marketing purposes and it is in all honesty what you will be doing. There are plenty of websites out there that have a wealth of information on Internet Marketing and can help you learn more about the trade.

Charges and Earnings

How much can you expect to make with your online advertising business and what can you charge clients for each job? Well, this one is difficult to answer as advertising really is a wide open field with respect to pricing guidelines. Basically, you can expect to be paid by the job and you will have to bid on those after seeing the requirements. You will definitely not be able to charge a lot at first but as you build your reputation and list of clients that you can include on your portfolio, your earnings will grow.

Marketing

As this is precisely what you will be helping potential clients with, your own marketing efforts will also demonstrate your abilities! You are going to want to create a website and optimize its content for the keywords "Internet Marketing" and "Online Advertising". I would also recommend implementing an E-mail marketing campaign and target it towards any businesses that you think might make great clients. And again, this is what you will be doing for your clients so DO NOT RUSH YOUR MARKETING CAMPAIGN!!! I am even going to go so far as to recommend keeping your day job until you have your marketing campaign ready to go. But, if you do a great job and plenty of homework, your online advertising business will be a success and the sky is the limit!