7 Recommended Books for Starting an Online Business

Cody Faldyn — Mon, 09 Feb 2015 18:50:02 +0000

7 Recommended Books for Starting an Online Business

Do you really need to attend a business school to be a successful entrepreneur? While it may help you in certain circumstances, it isn’t a necessity, especially when you want to start an online business. Pete Cashmore began Mashable when he was only 19. And look at how amazingly successful it is today!

But the road to success isn’t easy. You need to gather adequate information, couple it with wisdom and imagination to make things work. And what could be a better source for all these than books! Just take your pick, read and absorb what the best have to say.

Here’s a quick look at 7 of the best books for starting an online business:

Will It Fly? By Thomas K. McKnight

Does your business idea have wings? Or will it fall flat? The 44-item checklist in this one will help you find the answer to this vital question. Do you have the right personal traits? Do you know where the exits are? You’ll find answers to all your queries and also evaluate your chances of success.

The $100 Startup by Chris Guillebeau

Is it really possible to build a million dollar business on a modest budget? Guillebeau brings forward a series of case studies to prove his point. A pleasant read, this offers great value if you are on the lookout for a book that helps you understand why you should do what you love – and how to do it too.

The E-Myth Revisited by Michael E. Gerber

Being an entrepreneur isn’t exactly similar to being the mythical hero it is often cut out to be. If you wish to get the entrepreneurship facts straight, this is the book to read. It also illustrates the distinction between working ‘on’ your business and working ‘in’ your business.

The Barefoot Executive by Carrie Wilkerson

Want a little inspiration? Take up this book and glimpse Wilkerson’s journey to become a home-based entrepreneur. An entertaining read, this helps you understand the ways in which to tackle the core issues – identifying the target market, creating marketing strategies, building your brand, and so on.

The Lean Startup by Eric Ries

Creation and assessment of business processes may not be an easy task. And it is where this book can be a handy guide – when you are planning to start an online business, especially a software startup, this is one of the must-reads. And the best part, it comes from his experience.

The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss

Well, flexible work hours are one of the chief points that drive individuals to begin their own businesses. This book explores the opportunities that you can get when you decide to take the plunge. And the way the author relates the points in a fun and motivational manner makes it all the more interesting.

Lucky or Smart? by Bo Peabody

Bo Peabody was an online multimillionaire in his twenties. In this book he answers the important question – was it luck or was he smart enough to do it? He illustrates the way you can cultivate your perception and identify when he was plain lucky. Smart for him to do it!

No single book can be your only guide; read up on as many as you can before you take a step.

Recommended Books on Growing an Online Business:

Zero To One by Peter Thiel and Blake Masters
Digital Bacon by Alex Rodriguez
The Suitcase Entrepreneur by Natalie Sisson
The Startup Survival System by Kurt Won
Virtual Freedom by Chris Ducker

What books for starting an online business would you recommend to online entrepreneurs? Share your books in the comments below:

The post 7 Recommended Books for Starting an Online Business appeared first on The Entrepreneurs Library.

A Preview of Dream Year with Ben Arment

Wade Danielson — Wed, 06 Aug 2014 12:58:15 +0000

A summary of things you should know about Dream Year according to Ben Arment

Introduction

In this episode Ben Arment shares his insights on turning your dreams into reality with his book Dream Year. Over the course of 11 chapters, Arment gives you a practical guide for defining your dream, creating a business model, and a financial plan so entrepreneurs like you can market, grow, and sustain your new idea as a business. This is not a book about pursuing a hobby, this book is about helping you turn your passion into something that can be monetized.

The Book’s Unique Quality

I spend a lot of time at the beginning of the book showing people how their passion or their ideas are rooted in their past. I don’t know many business books that start that early on in an entrepreneur’s journey but I really do believe that the greatest ideas come from experiences when we were children.

The Reader’s Takeaway

I don’t want dreamers, makers or entrepreneur’s to believe that you have to be special in order to work for yourself or launch your own business. I think what Dream Year will do is it will demystify dreaming and it will break down the process of bringing a great idea to life in to very actionable, practical steps.

A Deep Dive Into The Book

The first chapter is called Daring to Dream and it is dealing with all of the issues that keep people away from pursuing their ideas. It talks about fear, risks and all of the things that frighten people about pursuing an idea.

The next chapter is called Defining the Dream and that is really about looking back at your history and realizing your dream didn’t just start now but it’s something you can trace back to your childhood.

The third chapter is called Your Idea Model and I call it that because not everybody wants to start a business. It’s helping people understand that the world is too full of ideas, what you need is a new idea model. It’s basically taking an idea that other people might be familiar with but flipping it on its head. When you create a new expression of that idea or new offering, it removes the competition, it reinvents the industry and it offers a really unique experience to the world.

Chapter four is called Your Financial Model and this is the backbone of the book. This is not a book about pursuing a hobby, this book is about helping you turn your passion in to something that can be monetized. I have this expression that goes a great idea is a spreadsheet with skin on, and that is really about helping people understand what the financial model of it will be long before it launches. The goal is to make a profit and to make sure that the effort you put in to it is worth it financially.

Chapter five is called Executing the Dream and it’s the notion that every dreamer, every entrepreneur is made up of two people. You got ordinary you and you also got CEO you. Most of us go through life living as ordinary you. We have bosses who tell us what to do or we have teachers in school that guide our learning and there really has to come a moment in our life when we decide that we’re going to take the reins. We have got to turn ourselves in to someone more capable in order to achieve our goals.

Chapter six is called The Big Ask and it is all about rain making. It’s about the idea that revenue is important to bringing your dream to life and the only way that is ever going to happen is if you get in to the business of making asks of people.

Chapter seven is called Branding the Dream. Branding the Dream is about crafting what you are offering to the world is. Not just what the idea is but how it will engage with the world and what kind of experience will you give your customers. It’s not just the logo, it’s not just the website, it’s how you answer the phone and it’s the total user experience. Steve Jobs once said that branding is not just your logo, it is customer service.

Chapter eight is called Building your Platform and it’s the fact that if you have a great idea, it doesn’t really matter if no one is aware of it. It’s important that we as entrepreneur’s, we as dreamers, build a platform of people while we are also constructing our business.

Chapter nine is called Marketing the Dream. Marketing is about creating demand for the dream, sales is about trying to convince people to buy something that they don’t really want. We talk about how you create demand for your dream, how you frame it in such a way so that people really want it. The goal of this chapter is to help people craft a property that excites people and builds demand for what you do.

Chapter ten is called Growing the Business. It’s about building the business and for a lot of people to get their business to work, they have to continue to adjust it, adapt it and change it.

The final chapter is called Sustaining the Dream and it’s about encouraging the entrepreneur to not quit. I think some of the most successful businesses in history have been those who have suffered early failures and they just didn’t quit. This chapter is where I feel like my gifts as a writer shine.

Notable Quotes From The Book

“From 30 thousand feet creating looks like art, from ground level it’s a to-do list.” – Ben Arment

“If it doesn’t work out quite the way you want it, you can always get another job, you can always rebuild your savings, you can get your dignity back but you can never recover what you never tried at all.” – Ben Arment

The Credibility/Inspiration Of The Author

I am the founder of an organization called Dream Year and we coach people in pursuing their passions and helping them turn them in to businesses.

Years ago I was blogging and actively logging my experiences, starting businesses and launching projects and I began getting a lot of e-mails from people asking how I did it. I found myself answering all of their questions in the exact same way and realized after a year of this that there was a need for someone to lay out what it looks like to bring a business to life. I began coaching people for about 4 or 5 years and all of my writing, e-mails and research yielded this beautiful book. It’s the combination of nearly five year of work and I am excited for people to read it.