Now that you have your niche market picked out, it is time to start thinking about your website. The first order of business is purchasing your domain name. There are hundreds of companies out there that sell domain names, so a search of Google or Yahoo will yield plenty of results for the keywords cheap domains. When choosing your domain name, try to think of something short, catchy and/or easy to remember. People are lazy - the less work, the better.
Your next action is to purchase a store for that dream of yours. If you are not knowledgeable in web design, no big deal. There are plenty of e-commerce solutions out there such as Yahoo store, Network Solutions, Prostores and ProductCart that are extremely user-friendly and require little or no HTML or web design experience (although learning some is very beneficial and recommended).
If you do have web design experience, or know someone that does, you can save yourself a lot of money and just have your website pages hosted by one of the many hosting companies out there. Even if you don't have any web design know-how or connections, there are many ways to find web designers that will design your site for a very affordable price through classified ad sites like Craigslist or job sites like eLance. Many designers are looking to make a name for themselves, and will give you a great deal in exchange for a referral or a link on your site.
One thing that you don't want to forget is some sort of merchant or payment solution. For a site that is just starting off, I would recommend Paypal. Their transaction fees are cheap, it is easy to sign up, their Website Payments Pro accepts credit cards, and practically everybody out there is familiar with Paypal. You may also want to look into Google Checkout, or one of the merchant companies that can do your credit card processing for you.
Hopefully this food for thought will get you brainstorming on the birth of your website. Check back soon for Step 3...
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